Kiren Rijiju slams China for renaming places in Arunachal; Assam CM Himanta proposes renaming 60 Tibet places in return

Union Minister Kiren Rijiju, who seeks to retain the Arunachal West Parliamentary constituency that goes to the polls on April 19, slammed China’s “illegally standardised geographical names” in his home State

Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma addresses a press conference at the BJP head office in Guwahati on March 23, 2024. | Photo Credit: ANI

GUWAHATI

Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Tuesday said India should rename 60 places in the Tibetan area of China as a tit for tat exercise, while Union Minister Kiren Rijiju said that China’s claims would not “change the ground reality and the historical facts”.

Beijing recently came out with a map renaming 30 places in Arunachal Pradesh in Chinese.

“My request to the Government of India is that we should give 60 geographical names for the Tibetan area of China. It should be always tit for tat but I do not want to comment because it is a policy decision of the Government of India, but if they name 30, we should name 60,” Mr. Sarma told journalists after a BJP election meeting in central Assam’s Karbi Anglong.

His Arunachal Pradesh counterpart, Pema Khandu reacted to the Chinese map as “another gimmick from China”.

“Being a proud citizen of Bharat and a native of Arunachal Pradesh, I strongly condemn this act of naming places within Arunachal Pradesh which has been an inalienable integral part of India. Proud citizens and patriots of Arunachal Pradesh are rejecting such antics,” he wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

On March 30, Mr. Khandu won the Mukto Assembly seat unopposed. Nine other BJP candidates also won their respective seats uncontested.

Minister of Earth Sciences and Food Processing Industries Kiren Rijiju, who seeks to retain the Arunachal West Parliamentary constituency that goes to the polls on April 19, also condemned China’s “illegally standardised geographical names” in his home State.

“China has been making all baseless claims but that’s not going to change the ground reality and the ‘historical facts’. Arunachal Pradesh is inalienable part of India and people of Arunachal Pradesh are supremely patriotic Indians by all standards and definitions,” he said.