India Slams 'Senseless' Attempts By China On Arunachal, Says Assigning Invented Names Won't Alter Reality

The Ministry of External Affairs on Tuesday firmly rejected China's attempt to rename several places in Arunachal Pradesh saying assigning invented names will "not alter the reality that the state will always be an integral and inalienable part of India.

"China has persisted with its senseless attempts to rename places in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh. We firmly reject such attempts. Assigning invented names will not alter the reality that Arunachal Pradesh is, has been, and will always be an integral and inalienable part of India," External Affairs ministry official spokesperson, Randhir Jaiswal said in an official statement. The MEA spokesperson was responding to media queries on renaming places in Arunachal Pradesh by China.

China has recently released a list of 30 places in Arunachal Pradesh in a bid to assert its claim over India's northeastern state. India has been rejecting such renaming of places by China. According to a March 30 report in its state-run Global Times, the Chinese Ministry of Civil Affairs released a fourth list of standardized geographical names in Zangnan, the name that China uses for Arunachal Pradesh.

According to the official website of the ministry, 30 additional publicly used place names in the Zangnan region have been officially revealed, the Global times report said. The Chinese Civil Affairs Ministry released the first list of the so-called standardised names of six places in Zangnan in 2017, while the second list of 15 places was issued in 2021 followed by another list with names for 11 places in 2023.

Set to take effect from May 1, 2024, the implementation measures stipulate in Article 13 that "place names in foreign languages that may harm China's territorial claims and sovereignty rights shall not be directly quoted or translated without authorization," the Global Times report said.

India has repeatedly rebuffed such attempts by China to rename places in Arunachal Pradesh. On Monday, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said that changing names won't have any effect and the northeastern state was, is and will always be India's part.

While addressing a press conference in Gujarat, Jaishankar said, "If today I change the name of your house, will it become mine? Arunachal Pradesh was, is and will always be a state of India. Changing names does not have an effect."

"Our army is deployed at the Line of Actual Control...," Jaishankar said. Additionally, Union Minister Kiren Rijiju condemned the baseless claims made by China will not change the ground reality. "I strongly condemn China's illegally 'standardised' geographical names given to 30 places inside Arunachal Pradesh. China has been making all baseless claims but that's not going to change the ground reality and the 'historical facts'," Rijiju said.

On March 28, reiterating that Arunachal Pradesh is an "integral and inalienable part of India," the Ministry of External Affairs said that China may repeat its "baseless claims" as many times as they want. but that will not change the position. In response to a query during a weekly media briefing, spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal stated, "Our position on the matter has been made very clear on Arunachal Pradesh time and again. We have recently also issued statements in this regard. I think a couple of statements." (ANI)