China’s new land border law may have serious ramifications for its border dispute with India. The new law, which comes into effect on January 1, 2022, aims to strengthen Beijing’s control over its border areas and stipulates that China’s territorial integrity is “inviolable”. Operationally, it enjoins the Chinese military to carry out border drills and provides state support for construction of border towns, strengthening of border defences and better integration of populations inhabiting border areas.

In other words, China is looking to legally formalise its claims over its disputed land borders by building permanent infrastructure and control systems in these areas. Which means that the current India-China border standoff resulting from Chinese encroachment of Indian territory in eastern Ladakh has slim chance of satisfactory resolution. True, there could be temporary on-ground adjustments like the establishment of the no-patrolling zone at Pangong Tso. But fundamentally the new law means that China will not budge from its border claims. This in turn means that the India-China boundary negotiation mechanism is as good as dead. It also forces India to deploy its army along the LAC in sizeable strength and for extended durations to prevent further Chinese ingress.

There’s no denying that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has long had to contend with the reality that its ethnic minorities occupy land that constitutes over two-thirds of China’s national territory and encompasses nearly all of China’s continental borders. While in the earlier CCP scheme Beijing sought to integrate ethnic minority populations with promises of respecting and preserving their cultural heritage, over the decades it went back on those assurances. As exemplified by the current Chinese regime’s policies in Tibet, Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia, there is a concerted attempt to Sinicise ethnic minority populations and change the demography of these provinces by encouraging Han Chinese migration to these areas.

The new border law is of a piece with this policy and settlement of Han Chinese in newly constructed Chinese border towns cannot be ruled out. Such a development is bound to significantly change the border dynamics with India. Meanwhile, the new border law can also be read as China’s rejection of India’s position linking resolution of the border dispute with the overall bilateral relationship. Beijing is clearly signalling that it won’t sacrifice its border claims to improve two-way ties. This should force New Delhi to rethink the possibility of a modus vivendi with Beijing. An aggressive, inflexible and belligerent China is here to stay.

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This piece appeared as an editorial opinion in the print edition of The Times of India.

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