A year after Galwan, a lot of questions still remain

Exactly a year ago, on June 15-16, 2020, in eastern Ladakh’s Galwan Valley area, soldiers of China’s People’s Liberation Army attacked a body of Indian soldiers of 16 Bihar Regiment and other units which had gone there to ensure the Chinese had adhered to the agreement reached on June 6 at a meeting of corps commanders from the two sides to facilitate the disengagement of forces at friction points.

The Chinese had to dismantle their camp in parts of the Galwan riverbed near the point where this river meets the Shyok. In an ambush late at night, the Chinese soldiers used iron rods and heavy clubs with steel spikes embedded in them. Twenty Indians, including their commanding officer, a Colonel, were killed. They fought back with bare hands but pushed the Chinese back that night, although the PLA would return later with China claiming it always had “sovereignty” over the Galwan area, which is an outlandish distortion of the facts.

June 15 is an anniversary of bravery and betrayal. To this may be added national humiliation, for Prime Minister Narendra Modi told Opposition parties on June 19 last year that the Chinese “had not intruded, were not intruding, and were not in occupation” of Indian territory.” This is at variance with the ground situation.

The Indian troops were carrying firearms as per protocol, but did not use them at Gal-wan, again as per border stabilisation protocols in force since

1987 and aimed to be confidence-building measures on the Line of Actual Control, the perceived boundary line. Such protocols were created to ensure “pe-ace and tranquility” on the border so that bi-lateral relations could continue unmolested in other areas. It is this process which has received a jolt from which it is yet to recover.

Acknowledging this at a public platform last month, external affairs minister S. Jaishankar noted that India-China relations were at a “crossroads”. He also observed that the ongoing relationship had been violated. The Chinese military is yet to vacate the areas where it intruded April

2020 onward. These add up to thousands of square kilometres in strategic regions, including areas where Chinese and Pakistani troops can potentially come together against India.

Numerous rounds of technical meetings between military officials, in some of which diplomats were included, have only produced homilies from China’s side. Repeated Indian requests to the Chinese government to disengage, de-escalate and normalise ties have fallen on deaf ears. Beijing seeks a return to normal without first vacating the encroached Indian territories. How matters go from here is not clear.

Strangely enough, the country’s military brass has not been above parroting the damaging narrative that no encroachments have occurred, and that India will “not give away an inch”. Evidently, they feel protected by the PM’s on-record June 19, 2020, observation, of which Beijing has taken full advantage. Baffled Indians naturally ask what the boundary negotiations are then all about. They also wonder about the relevance of the external affairs minister’s observations. Is the government speaking to its own people in different voices?

In all areas where China has violated the LAC, its troops are in Ladakh well to the west of the 1960 Chinese claim line, whose map coordinates were given to India by the Chinese four decades ago. But the government seems afraid to point this out to Beijing. India did not accept the claim line and adhered to its historical claim to Aksai Chin.