Many questions still remain about LAC patrolling pact: Congress

NEW DELHI: Asserting that "many questions remain" about the Modi government 's announcement that an agreement has been reached with China on patrolling arrangements along the line of actual control (LAC), Congress said on Wednesday "it expects that the disengagement will restore the status quo ante as it existed in March 2020".

"The foreign secretary has said that this is leading to disengagement and eventually a resolution of the issues that had arisen in these areas in 2020... we hope that India's worst foreign policy setback in decades is being honourably resolved," Congress general secretary in-charge of Jairam Ramesh said. The Congress statement came ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping's bilateral talks on the margins of the BRICS summit in Russia.

Congress said the government must take the people of India into confidence on the contours of the agreement. The party has demanded to know if Indian troops will be able to patrol up to the Indian claim line in Depsang to five patrolling points past the Bottleneck junction; will they be able to reach the three patrolling points in Demchok; will Indian soldiers continue to be restricted to Finger 3 in Pangong Tso when earlier they could go as far as Finger 8 and will patrols be permitted to access the three patrolling points in Gogra-Hot Springs.

"Are the 'buffer zones' that our government ceded to the Chinese, which included the site of a memorial in Rezang La to war hero and posthumous Param Vir Chakra awardee Major Shaitan Singh, now a thing of the past?," Ramesh asked.

Lashing out at the government over the way it has handled the entire situation, Ramesh observed that "this sorry saga is a complete indictment of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's gullibility and naivete regarding China."

"The Modi government's approach to the entire crisis could be described as DDLJ - Deny, Distract, Lie and Justify," Ramesh added.