Leh, April 05: In the wake of reports of Chinese incursions in the Ladakh region, the BJP deputed a delegation of its national leaders for an on-the-spot survey after which they demanded that Government stop the practice of issuing inner line permits but open up the area to tourism to defeat the “Chinese design of grabbing the land by inches”.
The five-member delegation headed by former Uttrakhand Chief Minister Bhagat Singh Koshiyari, party spokesperson Rajeev Pratap Rudy and former J and K state chief Nirmal Singh visited this area and bordering areas of Nyoma and Demchok, 300 kilometres from southeast of this Himalayan town.
“We have come here to ascertain reports about the Chinese incursion and what we have found is shocking…,” Rudy said here.
This is the first national-level political delegation to visit the far flung areas of this Himalayan town.
“The most shocking and frightful site was when we met those nomads and Ladakhi people. They are craving for every inch of land which they see has been encroached since 1962.
“The most stunning revelation was that most of the incursion that has taken place from 1965 to 1995 and the Chinese army had come and established posts,” said Rudy, who will be submitting a report to Party President Nitin Gadkari.
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After the briefing by Army’s Leh-based 14 Corps Commander Lt Gen S K Singh and other officials, Rudy said the latest strategy that Chinese have developed is that they have pushed their nomads and grazers into Indian territory.
“They are fighting a war through nomads and grazers. There are no conflict zones or day-to-day confrontation with armed forces but they are fighting the battle through nomads on grazing pastures…they are pushing nomads here and there.
“Its all about pasture land and gazers and they stand solidly behind these nomads….so they are inching through grazing land,” he said.
It may be mentioned that an official report last year of the state government had said “they (Chinese) have threatened the nomadic people who had been using Dokbug area (in Ladakh sector) area for grazing since decades long, in a way to snatch our land in inches.
–Agencies