Some news channels on Thursday claimed India and China were involved in military skirmishes along the Sikkim border. What could have led to a serious bilateral issue turned out to be an over-zealous interpretation of routine military vehicle movement.
According to military sources, there was a routine ‘turnover’ of military vehicles and tanks deployed at the border. Some vehicles were being replaced by new ones, as part of a routine exercise, after informing the Chinese.
The director-general of military operations at the army headquarters and the navy chief, Admiral Sureesh Mehta, denied any skirmishes.
The frayed tempers between India and China, lack of transparency in relations between the two and recent scaremongering by some experts contributed to extreme volatility in Sino-Indian relations, and more importantly in the public interpretation of bilateral ties.
The false news reports were the latest in a series of statements and developments on either side of the border that show up the difficulties of two big nations growing up into economic power houses with shared borders, searching resources in the same locations, and transporting goods through the same sea routes.
Throughout history, whenever neighbours have grown similarly, there have been military standoffs and disastrous wars.
Many within the establishment are cautioning of pitfalls of furious growth and disputes that linger on. Almost the entire land border between India and China is still disputed, and neither side is showing the political will to solve the problem.
A senior military officer, who has studied China for long, recently told DNA, “When two giants wake up, we have to expect trouble.” Tempers ran high in New Delhi recently when a Chinese ‘expert’ called for India’s Balkanisation. After much condemnation and pontification, it turned out that the article was by a blogger with no official links to the Chinese establishment.
