The Sino-Indian Boundary Issue continues ....

The Tawang Tract: The Monpas are not Tibetans themselves, but they follow Tibetan-style Buddhism, and Tawang, the main monastery in their area, is also the birth-place of the Sixth Dalai Lama. Many of these pockets of Tibetan religious affiliation have had allegiance to Lhasa’s religious-cum-temporal government, through the local monasteries. Donations were collected by the local monasteries as part of the Tibetan-Buddhist socio-religious system, necessitated by the numbers of the men and women who lived as celibate monks and nuns.

In addition, in this area three were also lay administrative officials of the Tibetan administration, the dzongpen, who were also tax-collectors But the lands of the Monpas extended southwards to the top of the first high ridge line overlooking the Brahmaputra valley of Assam, and thus the British had wanted to move the border between NEFA and Tibet further north to the edge of the Tibetan plateau at Bumla, leaving all the Monpa area within India. This is not a ethno-cultural problem zone, as the Monpas are distinct from Tibetans.

The problem is more that China claims the Tawang Tract as part of Tibet based on the administrative history, not on ethnicity. The Monpas themselves have no wish to be part of China, as has been repeatedly stated by the elected political leaders of the area, as well as by ordinary people, within and outside the Indian Parliament.

Arunachal Pradesh other than the Tawang Tract: The other communities of Arunachal Pradesh have not been part of the Tibet Buddhist cultural community at all, and are more related to various communities of modern north-eastern India and South-East Asia than to Tibet. The Indian Army often refers to this large geographical area as ‘Rest of Arunachal Pradesh (RALP)’. China’s claim on almost the entire state is dubious, both on these grounds and on the lack of any record of their ever having been administratively a part of Tibet.

To be continued....