Line of Actual Control

The western portion of the Line of Actual Control, which lies between Chinese-controlled and Indian-controlled territory in the Himalayan region. The line was the focus of a brief war in 1962, when Indian and Chinese forces struggled to control land where, "not even a blade of grass grows," as Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru put it.

The map shows the Indian and Chinese claims of the border in the western (Aksai Chin) region, the Macartney–MacDonald line, the Foreign Office Line, as well as the progress of Chinese forces as they occupied areas during the Sino-Indian War.

The Line of Actual Control (LAC) is a demarcation line that separates Indian-controlled territory from Chinese-controlled territory in the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, formed after the 1962 war.^[1]

There are two common ways in which the term "Line of Actual Control" is used. In the narrow sense, it refers only to the line of control in the western sector of the borderland between the two countries. In that sense, the LAC forms the effective border between the two countries, together with the (also disputed) McMahon Line in the east and a small undisputed section in between. In the wider sense, it can be used to refer to both the western line of control and the MacMahon Line, in which sense it is the effective border between India and the People's Republic of China (PRC).

Overview

The entire Sino-Indian border (including the western LAC, the small undisputed section in the centre, and the MacMahon Line in the east) is 4,056 km (2520 mi) long and traverses five Indian states: Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh.^[2] On the Chinese side, the line traverses the Tibet Autonomous Region. The demarcation existed as the informal cease-fire line between India and China after the 1962 war until 1993, when its existence was officially accepted as the 'Line of Actual Control' in a bilateral agreement.^[3] However, Chinese scholars claim that the Chinese Prime Minister Zhou Enlai first used the phrase in a letter addressed to Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru dated 24 October 1959.

Although no official boundary had ever been negotiated between China and India, the Indian government even today claims a boundary in the western sector similar to the Johnson Line of 1865, whereas the PRC government considers a line similar to the Macartney–MacDonald Line of 1899 as the boundary.^[4][5]

In a letter dated 7 November 1959, Zhou told Nehru that the LAC consisted of "the so-called McMahon Line in the east and the line up to which each side exercises actual control in the west". During the Sino-Indian War (1962), Nehru refused to recognise the line of control: "There is no sense or meaning in the Chinese offer to withdraw twenty kilometers from what they call 'line of actual control'. What is this 'line of control'? Is this the line they have created by aggression since the beginning of September? Advancing forty or sixty kilometers by blatant military aggression and offering to withdraw twenty kilometers provided both sides do this is a deceptive device which can fool nobody."^[6]

Zhou responded that the LAC was "basically still the line of actual control as existed between the Chinese and Indian sides on 7 November 1959. To put it concretely, in the eastern sector it coincides in the main with the so-called McMahon Line, and in the western and middle sectors it coincides in the main with the traditional customary line which has consistently been pointed out by China."^[7]

The term "LAC" gained legal recognition in Sino-Indian agreements signed in 1993 and 1996. The 1996 agreement states, "No activities of either side shall overstep the line of actual control."^[8] However clause No 6 of the 1993 Agreement on the Maintenance of Peace and Tranquility along the Line of Actual Control in the India-China Border Areas mentions, "The two sides agree that references to the line of actual control in this Agreement do not prejudice their respective positions on the boundary question"^[9].

The Indian government claims that Chinese troops continue to illegally enter the area hundreds of times every year.^[10] In 2013, there was a three-week standoff between Indian and Chinese troops 30 km southeast of Daulat Beg Oldi. It was resolved and both Chinese and Indian troops withdrew in exchange for a Chinese agreement to destroy some military structures over 250 km to the south near Chumar that the Indians perceived as threatening.^[11] Later the same year, it was reported that Indian forces had already documented 329 sightings of unidentified objects over a lake in the border region, between the previous August and February. They recorded 155 such intrusions. Later some of the objects were identified as planets by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics as Venus and Jupiter appearing brighter as a result of the different atmosphere at altitude and confusion due to the increased use of surveillance drones.^[12] In October 2013, India and China signed a border defence cooperation agreement to ensure that patrolling along the LAC does not escalate into armed conflict.^[13]

See also

• Sino-Indian border dispute
• Aksai Chin
• Arunachal Pradesh
• Sino-Indian relations
• Line of Control
• McMahon Line
• Tibet

References