The Indian army has denied reports of its personnel being detained by Chinese forces in Ladakh near the Pangong Tso lake earlier this week. Several media reports had claimed that the Chinese forces detained Indian soldiers and even snatched their weapons.
Pangong Tso lake is where the climax scene of Aamir Khan-starrer 3 Idiots was shot.
Meanwhile, news agency PTI reported that the troops of India and China were engaged in a heated exchange in eastern Ladakh near the Pangong Tso Lake on Wednesday. The skirmishes, according to the agency, started after Chinese Army personnel objected to patrol by Indian soldiers in the area.
Indian army sources have said that the reason for the latest exchange that left many Indian soldiers injured was the deferring perceptions about the LAC by both India and China.
“The situation became very volatile last Wednesday when a scuffle between Indian jawans and the Chinese resulted in detention of some of our jawans but later they were released,” a senior bureaucrat was quoted by NDTV.
Elsewhere, a former Indian army colonel has sensationally claimed that ‘for the first time since the Kargil intrusions of 1999, Indian territory is in the hands of foreign soldiers.’ Writing for a newspaper, Ajai Shukla, said that starting in the third week of April, more than 5,000 Chinese soldiers of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) had intruded into five points in Ladakh – four along the Galwan River, and one near the Pangong Lake.
Amidst rising tension in Ladakh, the Indian Army chief General MM Naravane visited the XIV Corps headquarters in Leh on Friday to review the situation.
General Naravane’s visit to Ladakh came just days after both Indian and Chinese soldiers were involved in violent skirmishes near the Pangong Tso lake between 5 and 6 May. More than 100 Indian and Chinese soldiers were injured in the violence.