New Delhi: The Indian Army, on Saturday, rejected claims on social media that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) had defeated Indian troops, advanced into Arunachal Pradesh, and established Chinese control over Indian territory.
The claims are fake and being amplified to promote a misleading narrative, the Army has said.
It has accused several suspected Pakistan-sponsored social media accounts of circulating “exaggerated” and “unsubstantiated” claims and called it a “coordinated inauthentic behaviour”,
In its official fact-check account on X.
“Several suspected Pak-sponsored social media accounts are circulating misleading claims that Chinese forces have severely defeated Indian troops, advanced nearly 50 km into Arunachal Pradesh and established PLA control over Indian territory,” it said.
“These false claims are being amplified in a coordinated manner to promote a misleading anti-Indian Army narrative,” the Army added.
Six handles were found to have circulated such misleading claims between November 6 and 7 to create an anti-Indian Army narrative, the Indian government has also said.
People should verify border-related claims through credible and official sources before sharing information, the Army has said.
This came months after reports of a standoff between Chinese and Indian troops in Arunachal Pradesh surfaced in July. Last month, Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) director general Shatrujeet Kapur said that the Shaurya platoon was successfully dealing with a “face-off”.
In his address to the troops in Rajasthan’s Alwar at a felicitation ceremony, Kapur purportedly said: “In recent days, there was a situation in Arunachal Pradesh where there was a face-off at different locations, which is still continuing. There our Shaurya commando teams did really exceedingly well.”
A video clip of his remarks was widely circulated online, triggering questions by the Opposition.
The situation along the India-China border areas gets disturbed from time to time when Chinese forces diverge from established patrolling patterns, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had said in response.
“Both sides continue to use existing diplomatic and military mechanisms to resolve outstanding issues and avoid misunderstanding and miscalculation along the Line of Actual Control. The two sides have also agreed to discuss ways to improve understanding of LAC in appropriate areas for better border management,” MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal had said.
Tensions had erupted between the Indian Army and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) at Taksing, a remote area of Arunachal Pradesh’s Upper Subansiri district, in July and August, Hindustan Times had reported earlier.
This happened before India and China held the first round of talks between military commanders in the eastern sector in Arunachal Pradesh on September 6 and 7, and days before Chinese president Xi Jinping travelled to India to attend the BRICS Summit during September 12-13.