No Comparison Between Chinese Aggression In 1962 And 2020: Congress To External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar

The Congress party on Monday said there is no comparison between the India-China confrontations of 1962 and 2020. 

The Congress said that India went to war with China to defend its territory in 1962 but after 2020 after “India has acquiesced to Chinese aggression with denials followed by disengagements' in which India has lost access to thousands of square kilometres of territory”.

The Congress party’s comments has come in the wake up of Minister of External Affairs S Jaishankar’s statement in which he said that India lost territory to China in 1962 under Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and not under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. 

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said that since May 2020, the Modi government's preferred strategy to deal “with the Chinese incursions in Ladakh has been summed up with DDLJ —Deny, Distract, Lie, Justify”.

He said, “External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar's recent remarks attacking the Congress party are simply the latest attempt to divert attention from the Modi government’s failed China policy, the most recent revelation being that since May 2020 India has lost access to 26 of 65 patrolling points in Ladakh.”

Ramesh also criticised Jaishankar for his comments on Rahul Gandhi’s meeting with the Chinese ambassador in 2017 and highlighted that Jaishankar as Indian envoy to the United States had also met the Republican leaders during the Barack Obama administration.

He said, “EAM Jaishankar's implied cheap shot at Shri Rahul Gandhi for meeting the Chinese ambassador in 2017 is ironic to say the least coming from someone who ambassador to the US during the Obama administration presumably met with leading Republicans.

“Are Opposition leaders not entitled to meet diplomats from countries that are important from a trade, investment, and security standpoint? Rather, the Modi government should have been truthful from the start and taken the Opposition into confidence by discussing the China crisis in parliamentary standing committees and debating the issue in Parliament.”

The BJP has mounted an on and off criticism of Rahul and the Congress party for their earlier engagement with China. Besides Rahul’s meeting with the Chinese ambassador around the time of the Doklam episode, the BJP has also criticised the alleged Chinese funding to the Congress-run Rajiv Gandhi Foundation (RGF). 

Ramesh further said, “At a very minimum, it should have held detailed briefings for leaders of major political parties. It is extraordinary that EAM Jaishankar has admitted on several occasions that he has no idea why China has turned aggressive on the Line of Actual Control, notwithstanding the unusually frequent contacts between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping and the PM's boast that he enjoys a special 'Plus One' relationship with President Xi.

“No amount of obfuscation can hide the fact that the Modi government has sought to cover up India's biggest territorial setback in decades that followed PM Modi's naive wooing of President Xi.

“We suggest that EAM Jaishankar and the government spend more time trying to get Chinese troops out of Depsang and Demchok and less time on blaming the opposition for their own incompetence.”