Summary
- In a statement, its leaders said the region “has been an inseparable part of India and will always remain so.”They also said local people had backed the Indian Army through every crisis, from the 1962 war with China to the Galwan clash.
- China, she said, had never recognised the “so-called Union Territory of Ladakh” that India set up unilaterally.
- In its statement, the group said the region “stands firmly with India” and that its people will keep upholding national unity.
The Apex Body Leh on Thursday rejected China’s refusal to recognise Ladakh as a union territory, widening a fresh row between Beijing and New Delhi.
The group is one of two Ladakh bodies holding talks with the central government on local demands. In a statement, its leaders said the region “has been an inseparable part of India and will always remain so.”
They also said local people had backed the Indian Army through every crisis, from the 1962 war with China to the Galwan clash. “No external power can dictate the identity, aspirations or future of Ladakh,” the group said.
China rejects Ladakh place names
The latest dispute flared after India’s Ministry of Home Affairs gave standard names to 28 places in Ladakh on October 2. They include peaks, passes, glaciers and water bodies, now marked on official Survey of India maps. The list includes Zorawar Peak, Kanishka Peak, Skamri Glacier, Shkorga Valley and Guru Rinpoche Lake.
Several lie on the Line of Actual Control (LAC). Among them are Gogra and Hot Spring, two flashpoints from the 2020 standoff that started after clashes near Pangong Lake.
On Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning dismissed the exercise. China, she said, had never recognised the “so-called Union Territory of Ladakh” that India set up unilaterally.
She called the move “illegal and invalid.” In her words, it cannot alter Beijing’s position that areas in the western sector of the boundary belong to China.
India hits back over Ladakh
New Delhi quickly pushed back. Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said the territory is “an integral and inalienable part of India.”
“No amount of denial by the Chinese side can change this established fact,” he said.
Jaiswal added that officials chose the names after consulting the local administration and stakeholders. According to him, the aim is accurate recognition and better public awareness of these places.
He also said the Home Ministry’s press release was self-explanatory, and he declined to go further. Beijing, for its part, has given no sign that it will accept the new names.
A long-running border dispute
The two nuclear-armed neighbours share an 832-km frontier in eastern Ladakh that neither side has ever demarcated. Both sides keep large forces along the LAC, and their claims overlap.
India split Ladakh off as a separate union territory in August 2019. China’s latest remarks, however, add a new twist to the long-running quarrel over the frontier.
Meanwhile, the Leh body said “our people have made immense sacrifices” in guarding the country’s borders over the decades. “Our patriotism, national commitment and loyalty to the nation are unwavering,” the group said.
In its statement, the group said the region “stands firmly with India” and that its people will keep upholding national unity.
It also said Ladakh takes pride in India’s democratic framework, which it said upholds freedom, equality and constitutional rights.
For now, neither side has shown any sign of softening. As a result, a row over names on a map has become the latest test of ties between the two neighbours.
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