By Dr. Gyan Pathak
In spite of Supreme Court of India’s bench comprising Justices Dipankar Datta and Augustine George Masih’s poser on August 4, 2025 on Rahul Gandhi’s remark on India’s 2000 sq km land gone to China saying that a true Indian will not say this, the issue will remain in public and political discourse.
“Why in social media post and not in parliament? How do you get to know when 2000 sq km was acquired by China? What is the credible material? A true Indian will not say this. When there is a conflict across border, can you say all this. Why can’t you ask the question in parliament? Just because you have 19(1)(a) you cannot say anything,” the Bench said, while staying a criminal defamation case against him before a Lucknow court.
The questions posed by the bench will have no effect on the public and political discourse on the issues since it concerns the loss of India land amounting 2000 sq km. It is not only an allegation made by a leader of an opposition political party during his 2022 Bharat Jodo Yatra, but the estimate was supported by the buffer-zone claims, loss of patrolling points, grazing land access, and strategic analysis of experts and former military veterans.
Union Government of India had denied it and maintains that India has not ceded any territory since 2020 China-India classes in Ladakh. However, this topic has come up indirectly through various discussions, questions by opposition members, and reports by independent think tanks and media.
Ministry of Defence & External Affairs have routinely faced questions in Parliament about the situation along the Line of Actual Control (LAC), especially after the Galwan Valley clash in June 2020. During the parliament session of 2020 to 2024, opposition leaders like Rahul Gandhi and MPs from political parties such as Congress, and DMK repeatedly raised concerns about it. The opposition political parties have said that India was losing patrolling rights in areas like Depsang Plains and Demchok, creation of buffer zones inside India territory, and lack of transparency in agreements with China.
Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi is Lok Sabha and Jairam Ramesh in Rajya Sabha had claimed in the past that China had occupied approximately 2000 sq km of Indian territory in Eastern Ladakh. They specifically cited loss of 26 out of 65 patrolling points, buffer zones, and encroachments over grazing lands.
Strategic affairs experts like Col. Ajay Shukla, Manoj Joshi, and researchers involved in the Ladakh Police paper estimate that India has lost access or control over an area totaling about 2,000 sq km since June 2020, due to buffer zones and patrolling restrictions.
A January 2023 internal paper—presented at a DGP conference—highlighted that out of 65 Patrolling Points, Indian access was lost to 26. The resulting buffer zones amount to significant territorial control loss.
The Telegraph had published a report in 2023 quoting a former lieutenant-general and military veterans who have claimed the estimated 2000 km Indian land lost to the Chinese incursions. A defence analyst Sushant Singh was quoted in the report saying, “Keeping Indians in the dark about the situation on the LAC is not just undemocratic and evades accountability of political/ military decision-making, it also has given foreign powers great leverage over you as they know what information, if placed in public, will embarrass you.”… “The buck stops with the top. And if a border crisis has been on for three years, where India has lost control of 2,000sqkm of territory with no plans visible for regaining control, there is no one else who can take the blame.”
A retired major general was also quoted referring external affairs minister S. Jaishankar’s statement who had said. “Issue is not about territory; issue is of forward deployment. Both armies are standing very close to each other. And this could lead to violence the way it did in Galwan.”
There are other claims also about the loss of Indian land. It was reported that as part of the disengagement process, buffer zones have been established inside Indian areas. A councillor of the LADC in Ladakh said that Indian territory has been turned into a “buffer zone” after Indian and Chinese troops completed disengagement from Gogra Hot Springs in eastern Ladakh. He said “Our troops have gone back from not only PP-15 but also PP-16, which we had for the last 50 years or so. (…) Our grazing grounds have now become a buffer zone”.
Former Rajya Sabha MP from the BJP, Subramaniam Swamy had said in a tweet that India had withdrawn from its own territory. Indian military veterans said that the buffer zones represent a “new status quo” and that the creation of these zones amounted to “ceding further Indian territory” to the Chinese.
In 2020, India had rejected the proposal of equidistant disengagement as it would mean “loss of territory for its own side”, however, ended up agreeing to the same proposal in 2022. By 2023, it was claimed by many experts and military veterans that 2000 sq km land had been ceded to China. In January 2023, a paper presented to the Ministry of Home Affairs with inputs from Ladakh Police, stated that India had lost access to 26 out of 65 Patrolling Points in eastern Ladakh since June 2020.
It is surprising that Supreme Court of India said today on August 4, 2025in reference to Rahul Gandhi that “a true Indian will not say this”, which is expected by many to gag public and political discourse on the issue. However, such posers will have no effect, and the discourse will continue until the PM Narendra Modi government come out clean in the matter. Experts, analysts, military veterans saying the same thing that Rahul Gandhi said about loss of 2000 sq km Indian land to China and asking for accountability of the Modi government both in the Parliament and in the public.
Any true Indian and certainly a political leader like Rahul Gandhi can ask for accountability of the PM Narendra Modi led government which has lost actual control on its own land after June 2020, and where our shepherds can’t go now to graze their animals as they were going before. People would go on asking who is actually a “true Indian” – one who is demanding for regaining their lost land, or who have just ceded its own land in the name of buffer zone, or failed retain its land? Modi government must not be allowed to hide behind our military heroes, since they sacrificed their lives in defending the land, while the government lost it due to its wrong policy and ill-conceived agreement. (IPA Service)
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