India, China should fix their border

India and China have agreed to pack up the tents of their soldiers on the Depsang plain, near the Line of Actual Control ( LAC) in the Aksai Chin area. The soldiers will pull back to their original positions. Thus, a three-week standoff ends, not with anger and flying bullets, but with handshakes across the border. This is welcome. Indian media had launched a campaign so unrestrained and loud that, sometimes, it seemed that the two Asian giants were already at each other’s throats. But when it came to resolution, cool heads and diplomacy succeeded and hotheaded posturing failed.

Now, it is time for India and China to settle an issue that neither nation has had time to settle over decades: demarcate our extensive border with each other. After that is done to mutual satisfaction, the two nations should sign a comprehensive boundary agreement. This will bring the curtains down on misunderstandings that have persisted from colonial times, when the British drew borders or set up boundary posts according to their own convenience. In 1947, when the British left, there was much ambiguity over where the borders of India ended and those of our neighbour began, although the official position claimed certainty. In any case, China was engulfed by civil war and had no stable regime in charge.

Today, India’s only territorial dispute is restricted to our border with China, apart from the Pak-occupied part of Kashmir. Beijing, on the other hand, has to deal with disputes with Japan, and southeast Asian nations. It settled border disputes with Russia only in 2004. It should, therefore, be relatively easier for an undistracted India to come to a border agreement with China. It should do so, quickly, for the continued mental peace of the citizens of both nations.