The war of words over the Dalai Lama’s visit to Arunachal Pradesh took a sharper turn on Thursday, with state-run Chinese media warning that the Tibetan leader’s nine-day visit to the State, which China claims, would lead to serious consequences. India’s ambassador to China Vijay Gokhale was called in to the foreign ministry office in Beijing on Wednesday, to express China’s strong displeasure over the visit.
China cites historical reasons to claim huge swathes of the State, including Tawang, which houses the largest Buddhist monastery outside Lhasa. On Thursday, an editorial in the state-run Global Times warned that China, apart from being far more powerful, also wielded enormous influence in India’s ‘turbulent northern states’.
Hence, ‘if China engages in a geopolitical game with India, will Beijing lose to New Delhi?’
India, on the other hand, asserts that Arunachal is an Indian state which elects members to Parliament. One of them, Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju, has asked China to stop interfering in India’s internal affairs, while the Chief Minister of the State, Pema Khandu, has said China has no right to threaten India on the “Dalai Lama’s movement within the country, as India shares boundary with Tibet and not China.”
“This is a statement they (Beijing) have to make,” says General (retd) Jiti Bajwa, editor of Indian Defence Review and author of several books and papers on the People’s Liberation Army.
“They have said that Arunachal, rather Tawang, is part of southern Tibet, and the ‘Splittist’ Dalai Lama should not go there. So if he’s going there and they keep quiet, their own people will ask why they are not doing anything. So, it’s a political necessity for them. Calling in an ambassador hardly matters. They had even called our Ambassador Nirupama Rao at midnight (in 2008, when Tibetans tried to scale the walls of the Chinese embassy in New Delhi). These are normal diplomatic actions when they want to make a strong statement,” Jiti Bajwa says.
“India has also taken a strong stand, that this is our country. The resolution is you have to sit somewhere and talk. They cannot threaten and get anything out this way. Also, why are they claiming this monastery (in Tawang)? If it is only a religious place, then we have been going to Kailash Mansarovar for centuries... we have not cited historical grounds to say it belongs to us! As for Kashmir, the disputed areas are with them. The disputed areas are known. They can’t create new disputes. Can they now say we are taking over more of eastern Ladakh? That would be an act of war! But if they are talking about the Line of Actual Control, those disputes will be sorted out on the ground. They cannot conquer territory. Or add to the disputed territory,” he adds.
Jabin T Jacob, a Fellow at the Institute of Chinese Studies, New Delhi, has a different take.
“The Chinese now have a very different view of themselves,” Jacob says.“Xi Jinping is meeting Trump as we speak, and I think they want to keep the focus on that. I wouldn’t take Global Times too seriously. The Chinese leaders and their media have all become extremely confident of putting their point of view across, and India too has begun to matter in their perceptions now. We’ve also called in their chaps for a demarche every now and then. Also, they have been telling us for a few years that they have to be more responsive to Chinese public opinion, including social media. So calling in our ambassador is as much a signal to their domestic audience as it is for India. They are taking a strong line on reincarnation. They have objected to every statement the Dalai Lama has made, like maybe he will not reincarnate, or maybe he will be reincarnated in non-Chinese controlled territory,” he says.