On April 14, China’s ministry of civil affairs quietly announced that it had come up with “new standardised names” for six places in Arunachal Pradesh. This came even as Indian media reports claimed that Beijing had toned down its tirade against India because it wanted New Delhi to attend the mega One Belt One Road Forum being held in Beijing next month.
On Thursday, when asked about these new names, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Lu Kang said, “The authorities in charge of managing China's geographical names were exercising their lawful rights in publicly releasing these names ... It is legitimate. These names are passed down by ethnic minority groups like Menba and Zang who have long been living ... and have been calling these places as such for generations. These names reflect from another angle that China's territorial claim over South Tibet is supported by clear evidence in terms of history, culture and administration.”
While the six places have not been clearly demarcated by China, a rough extrapolation from the coordinates indicate they could be the districts of Tawang, Kra Daadi, West Siang, Siang, Anjaw and Subansiri. This move is seen as pressure tactics similar to the one used in the South China Sea, where Beijing renamed several islands to prove historical rights, and as retaliation for New Delhi having allowed the Dalai Lama to visit Arunachal despite Chinese protests. Lu, however, delinked the two, saying the renaming was part of “the second nationwide survey on geographical names ... More standardised names will be released when the time and condition is right.” New Delhi, while reiterating that Arunachal is an integral part of India, should shrug off the event. We will have a bit of an issue with maps again, and the whole border negotiations will probably take another twist. But as one official wryly remarked, “the India of today is not the same as it was in 1962”.