India has rejected China’s comments over Home Minister Amit Shah’s trip to Arunachal Pradesh, claiming that they don’t alter the facts on the ground. China had vehemently objected to Mr. Shah’s trip to Arunachal Pradesh, arguing that it violated Beijing’s territorial sovereignty.

“The statements made by the spokesperson for China’s government are entirely rejected by us. Like any other Indian state, Arunachal Pradesh is visited frequently by Indian politicians”, Arindam Bagchi, a spokeswoman for the foreign ministry, stated in a statement today.

He further said, “Arunachal Pradesh is and always has been a vital, intrinsic component of India. Objecting to such visits is unreasonable and will not alter the aforementioned reality”.

The Home Minister’s remarks at the commencement of a village welfare programme in Arunachal Pradesh’s Anjaw district, some 40 kilometres from the trijunction of India, China, and Burma and 11 kilometres from the Line of Actual Control (LAC), were echoed in the foreign ministry’s statement.

Mr. Shah said, “The day when people could infringe on our property has long since passed. They are no longer allowed to remove even a pin’s worth of our land”.

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China renamed a few locations in Arunachal Pradesh last week that it claims are in its possession.

In answer to a query over Mr. Shah’s visit, Chinese spokesperson Wang Wenbin stated that “Zangnan is China’s territory”.

Wenbin further stated that the Indian official’s visit to Zangnan violated Chinese territorial sovereignty and was detrimental to the calm and harmony along the border.

India has always maintained that Arunachal Pradesh is an integral part of the country, and China’s innovative nomenclature will not affect the ground reality.

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