An Expert Explains the LAC issue: ‘The Chinese are using ambiguity on the LAC… as a major pressure point against us’

The traditional boundary in the Eastern Sector (present-day Arunachal Pradesh) was formalised and delineated on maps through an exchange of letters between Indian and Tibetan Plenipotentiaries on March 24 and 25, 1914. At that time, Tibet was fully entitled to enter into treaties, and the Chinese government had recognised these rights.

All three representatives initialled the draft Simla Convention on April 27, 1914. When the final Convention was presented for signature on July 3, 1914, the Chinese Plenipotentiary refused to sign it, while the other two did. Chinese reservations were regarding the boundaries of “Outer Tibet” and “Inner Tibet,” not the India-Tibet boundary.

After the fall of China’s Qing dynasty in 1911, China did not exercise any control over Tibet — even earlier, those links were ambivalent. The Tibetan government administered its territory and engaged in external dealings independently. It was only in 1950, when Chinese Communist forces entered Tibet, that Beijing established control. This historical reality underscores that the McMahon Line was negotiated between British India and the competent Tibetan authority of the time, and that China’s objections then were unrelated to the India–Tibet boundary drawn at Simla.

As for the history of India-China “LAC”, this concept was first mentioned by Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai in his letter dated November 7, 1959, to Jawaharlal Nehru. Zhou described it as the line up to which each side exercised actual control. He proposed that the armed forces of China and India each withdraw 20 kilometres from the McMahon Line in the East, and from the line up to which each side exercised actual control in the West. Nehru rejected the concept of the LAC as proposed by Zhou.

However, an LAC did emerge as a fait accompli after the Chinese invasion of 1962 and their subsequent withdrawal in the Eastern Sector.

Zhou Enlai’s letter of November 15, 1962, addressed to the Heads of Government of Asian and African countries, reiterated the proposal for adherence to the “LAC of 7 November 1959,” which was shown on a small-scale map appended to the letter. India found this proposal unacceptable, as it would have legitimised the Chinese occupation of Aksai Chin.

Moreover, the Chinese concept of the “LAC of 7 November 1959” was a flexible and movable construct. In the Western Sector (Ladakh), the LAC was supposed to coincide with the Chinese claim line, which had shifted significantly to India’s disadvantage since 1956. China’s boundary alignment evolved from the 1956 map to the 1960 map by expanding claims, and after the 1962 conflict, the ground realities shifted to reflect Chinese military occupation beyond even those claim lines.

In the Eastern Sector, China agreed that the LAC coincided with the McMahon Line but differed on its interpretation. The Chinese argued illogically for a literal interpretation based on the original maps and transposing them onto contemporary maps. India has maintained that the boundary line as shown on small-scale Simla Conference maps must be interpreted on the basis of its underlying principle, that is, the highest watershed of the region.

In Sikkim, China accepted the watershed boundary based on the Anglo-Chinese Convention of 1890, but claimed pockets on the Indian side of the watershed. In the Middle Sector (Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh), China claimed some pockets south of the watershed, further complicating the issue.

How did India and China come to an understanding on the LAC?

India formally accepted the concept of LAC during negotiations leading up to the Border Peace and Tranquility Agreement (BPTA) of September 1993. It was a pragmatic change in India’s position. Border areas had turned live after the Chinese encroachment in Wangdung in the Eastern Sector and our forceful response involving forward deployment of troops in 1986-87. Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s visit to China in December 1988 stabilised the relationship, but border tensions had underlined the urgency of developing an architecture for the maintenance of peace and tranquility.

The concept of the LAC was incorporated in the BPTA signed during Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao’s visit to China in September 1993. Article 1 of the Agreement says that pending an ultimate boundary settlement, both sides will strictly respect and observe the LAC. We accepted the construct of LAC but rejected the Chinese concept of “LAC of 7 November 1959”. The LAC is based on actual control, and not some notional or historical alignment.

This key agreement became the basis for developing an elaborate architecture of confidence-building measures (CBMs), which by and large ensured peace in border areas. Of course, this changed after Chinese transgressions in Eastern Ladakh and the deadly Galwan clash in 2020.

We signed another important agreement on military CBMs in November 1996. As the Indian lead, I found that the Chinese were reasonable in these negotiations and responded positively to our suggestion regarding seeking “common understanding” of the LAC as a practical requirement.

Thus, Article 10 stipulates that, recognising that the full implementation of the Agreement would require a common understanding of the alignment of the LAC, the two sides agreed to speed up the process of its clarification and confirmation, and exchange maps indicating their respective perceptions of the entire alignment of the LAC as soon as possible.

However, the exchange of maps didn’t proceed smoothly. By 2002, the two sides had exchanged maps of the Middle Sector, which showed some Chinese claims south of the watershed boundary. However, we are in effective control of the LAC as projected by us in the Middle Sector.

Maps were prepared for the Western Sector, but China refused the exchange, saying India had inflated its claim. Indian officials pointed out that India also found their maps unacceptable, but the idea was to exchange maps showing respective perceptions. By then, the Chinese had concluded that they did not want to proceed with clarification.

The process broke down around 2004, and since then, there has been no forward movement on LAC clarification. The bottom line is that the Chinese are using ambiguity on the LAC and unsettled borders as a major pressure point against us.

How has India responded to China’s claims on Arunachal Pradesh?

Despite China’s claims on Arunachal Pradesh, we are in control up to the watershed boundary. There are only three pockets where they are in what we call “adverse possession” — parts of Namka Chu Valley, Sumdorong Chu Valley and Longju. However, differences in the interpretation of the McMahon line persist, and there are probings by the Chinese side from time to time.

They have raised the profile of their claims over large tracts in Arunachal Pradesh and also resiled from their earlier “package proposal”. During his visit to India in 1960, Zhou had told Nehru that though China didn’t recognise McMahon Line, it was prepared to take a “realistic view”, suggesting Chinese accommodation of the Indian position in the Eastern Sector, provided India was willing to accommodate the Chinese claim in the Western Sector.

During then Foreign Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s visit to China in 1979, Chinese President Deng Xiaoping offered a “package proposal”. Deng later made a public offer in an interview to Vikrant magazine in 1980: China will make concessions in the Eastern Sector and India in the Western Sector on the basis of the actually controlled border line to solve the boundary question in a package plan.

In 1985, the Chinese did a volte face. They said the area of “greatest difference” was in the Eastern Sector, and India must make “substantive concessions” there and only then would China make “corresponding concessions” in the Western Sector.

During negotiations on the Agreement on the Political Parameters and Guiding Principles for Boundary Settlement of 2005, for which I was the Indian lead, they again pressed for major adjustments by India in the East, which we rejected. In order to protect our interests in respect of Tawang, which the Chinese have been claiming, we insisted on a provision, which they accepted most reluctantly. This states that in reaching a boundary settlement, the two sides shall safeguard the due interests of their settled populations in the border areas.

Yet, the Chinese soon resurrected their narrative of “Zangnan” or “South Tibet” for Arunachal Pradesh. Their claims are now being reiterated more stridently and accompanied by measures like the renaming of places in Arunachal as well as harassment of Indian nationals from Arunachal Pradesh, like the recent arbitrary detention of an Indian national transiting through Shanghai.

Has the frequency with which such claims are being raised increased?

Over the past decade or so, China has become more aggressive in unilaterally asserting its contested territorial claims through “grey zone operations”, where they incrementally try to change the situation on the ground, staying under the threshold of an outright military conflict.

Even in Eastern Ladakh, there is still unfinished business of disengagement as there are continuing restrictions on patrolling by Indian troops and grazing activities of Indian herdsmen in areas they were traditionally visiting in “buffer zones”. If these arrangements become permanent, the Chinese side would have partially achieved its objective of making incremental changes.

Another significant change must be considered — during previous discussions, both sides were clear about differentiating the LAC from sovereignty-related issues. China no longer maintains that differentiation. Xi Jinping has repeatedly emphasised that China will not cede “even an inch” of its territory.

The Chinese term “core interests” has gradually moved from a primarily Taiwan-focused usage to a broader political scope that covers sovereignty and territorial integrity related claims across maritime and land disputes. However, any official Chinese document that explicitly lists “Zangnan” as a “core interest” of China is not commonly cited in the public domain; instead, the territorial claim on large parts of Arunachal Pradesh is visible through practice, rhetoric, and administrative signalling.

The 2005 agreement stipulated that an early boundary settlement should be pursued as a strategic objective. Today, China is no longer interested in that. They believe time is on their side, and maintaining a degree of pressure on us in border areas doesn’t hurt.

We take China’s claims in the Eastern Sector seriously and reinforce our deterrence strategy. Chinese claims are not just a negotiating ploy but part of their territorial agenda, with concomitant risks involved. We must guard against the recurrence of Eastern Ladakh-type Chinese operations across the LAC in the Eastern Sector.