The clash between Indian and Chinese soldiers on the night of June 15 – resulting in the death of 20 Indian soldiers, including a Colonel – has outraged India, and there is mounting hostility against China among the public. In Varanasi, an NGO burnt an effigy of President Xi Jinping. Readers might recall that Prime Minister Modi had hosted President Xi Jinping in Varanasi just a few months ago – in October 2019.
Protests have taken place in many places, including in Ahmedabad, where Modi first hosted Xi Jinping in 2014. Many Indians have called for a boycott of Chinese goods and in places, television sets made in China have been smashed up. However, trade is a weapon that cannot be used against another country without hurting oneself. Moreover, India needs to be cognisant that trade between the two countries is heavily in China’s favour.
Though we do not have, as yet, the precise chain of events leading to the clash, even as talks were going on at the level of military commanders, it is reasonably clear that India, keen to de-escalate and announce a settlement, would not have taken the initiative for the stand-off. One version is that China had agreed to demolish a tent, had demolished it, but put it up again; the Indian patrol party that went there to ask them to demolish the tent got into an altercation. The outnumbered Indians called for reinforcements and about a hundred or more on either side fought. No shots were fired but the Chinese had batons with nails on them. It appears that the hand-to-hand fighting continued for hours.
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