Four years after Indian and Chinese militaries clashed along the de-factor border, the India-China military stand-off is far from over.

In April 2020, the Chinese soldiers crossed over into Indian territory in Ladakh and clashed with Indian personnel, triggering the stand-off that continues to this date. The stand-off and accompanying skirmishes, which turned fatal on June 15, 2020, when 20 Indian soldiers and an unspecified number of Chinese soldiers were killed, plunged the India-China relationship to its lowest since 1962 when the two nations fought a brief war.

Since then, several rounds of talks at the level of senior military officers, top diplomats, and top ministers have taken place. While the troops have disengaged at some points, broader de-escalation is yet to take place.

In such context, the comment by Minister of External Affairs S Jaishankar a few weeks back that “75 per cent” of the stand-off had got resolved led to speculation whether the stand-off was heading towards a resolution. Later, however, Jaishankar clarified that he was merely talking about disengagement and the stand-off was far from any resolution.

Here is how things stand in eastern Ladakh and what we know of the resolution of the stand-off so far.

Jaishankar says 75% stand-off resolved — then clarifies

Earlier this month, External Affairs Minister Jaishankar’s comments at an event in Switzerland were interpreted as saying that 75 per cent of the border stand-off had been sorted — but that was not what he meant.

In a conversation with former diplomat Jean-David Levitte at the Centre for Security Policy in Geneva, Jaishankar said that “75 per cent of disengagement problems are sorted out” with China even as “some things” are left out, according to ANI.

Then, earlier this week, Jaishankar clarified that he only referred to the disengagement and the broader de-escalation still remained.

Disengagement refers to troops physically disengaging from a particular point of friction. De-escalation refers to the broader withdrawal of troops and war-waging equipment such as tanks, armoured vehicles, warplanes, and artillery guns, from the broader theatre. No de-escalation has taken place so far and even disengagement is not yet complete — as Jaishankar also said.

Clarifying the previous comments, Jaishankar said, “When I said 75 per cent of it has been sorted out, I was asked in a way to quantify — it’s only regarding the disengagement.”

Jaishankar further said that the India-China relationship is “significantly disturbed” after 2020 and patrolling remained the main issue.

“The main issue right now is patrolling — how both sides patrol up to the Line of Actual Control. The patrolling arrangements after 2020 have been disturbed,” said Jaishankar.

Series of high-level meetings — but military-level talks delayed

There has been a string of high-level engagements between India and China in recent months.

In July and August, the Working Mechanism for Consultation & Coordination on India-China Border Affairs (WMCC) met twice.

In the past two months, Jaishankar also met Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi twice. National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval also met Wang earlier this month on the sidelines of a BRICS conclave in Russia — the same visit in which he met Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly as a messenger of Prime Minister Narendra Modi regarding the Russia-Ukraine War.

There have been reports that some progress —even if not an outright breakthrough— has been made in the meetings. The tone of the public messaging around the meetings certainly suggests so.

After the Doval-Wang meeting, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said they reviewed the recent efforts towards finding an early resolution of the remaining issues along the LAC, which will create conditions to “stabilise and rebuild” bilateral relations.

“Both sides agreed to work with urgency and redouble their efforts to realize complete disengagement in the remaining areas,” said the MEA.

The tone was much cordial than last year when Doval conveyed to him that Chinese actions since 2020 had “eroded strategic trust” and the “public and political basis” of the bilateral relationship, as per the MEA, which added that he also emphasised the importance of resolving the situation so that “impediments to normalcy” in bilateral relations may be resolved.

Even as talks at political and diplomatic level have continued, no military-level talks have taken place since February. Observers have said that the gap —longest since 2020 when the stand-off began— may reflect the fact that talks over certain friction points like Depsang Plains and Demchok may have stalled.

This may be an over-interpretation as well. Military-level talks are meant for tactical ground-level affairs and actual decisions to disengage or de-escalate are taken at the top political level. As the purpose of military-level talks is to figure out the implementation of the understanding reached at the political level, the absence of talks may simply mean that as negotiations are ongoing at diplomatic and political level, the military-level talks are naturally on a pause. Once an understanding is reached at the political level, the military-level talks for its implementation may start.

Glass half-full or half-empty: What happened in 2020, how is it now?

While the situation along the LAC in Ladakh has calmed to the extent that no fresh round of significant clashes has happened in a long time, the situation remains far from ideal as the stand-off continues and patrolling remains limited in the region.

As patrolling is critical to asserting one’s claim to the territory and enforcing that claim, the lack of patrolling effectively negates your claim and control of that territory. It has been a Chinese practice to effectively gain control of stretches of territory by denying the other side the right to patrol that territory.

In 2020, the deadliest confrontation took place at Pangong Tso lake, whose control is divided between India and China, and Galwan Valley where 20 Indian soldiers were killed in clashes with Chinese soldiers.

Even though there are several locations and patrolling points (PPs) in contention, the major areas of contention have been Pangong Tso, PP-17 at Gogra-Hot Springs area, PP-15, Galwan Valley, Depsang, and Demchok.

So far, disengagement has taken place at Pangong Tso, PP-15, PP-17, and Galwan Valley, whereas deadlock continues to persist regarding Depsang and Demchok, according to The Hindu.

The disengagement had happened by 2022 and no change in the ground situation has taken place in the past two years, a defence official told The Hindu.

Is an India-China thaw on the horizon?

Even as no disengagement has taken place in two years —and de-escalation is yet to start at all— there are indications that a thaw may be on the horizon.

India and China have made “significant progress” in narrowing their gap on pending issues along the LAC in eastern Ladakh, according to The Indian Express.

Officials told the newspaper that the progress was made during the latest diplomatic- and political-level talks between India and China — the series of high-level exchanges mentioned above.

The newspaper reported that, following the progress made in the diplomatic- and political-level talks, the 22nd round of military-level talks are expected to be held shortly to chalk out the modalities, including the timeframe, for revised troop deployment in the region as per the terms of the agreement.

Sources told the newspaper that this might imply that Indian personnel, whose access to certain PPs and areas along the LAC in Ladakh had been restricted since 2020, might be close to accessing the PPs and areas again.

As per a report, India may have lost access to as many as 26 of 65 patrolling points along the LAC.

In a research paper submitted to a national police conference last year, an officer said while initially the access is lost as Indian forces themselves don’t patrol these areas and later the Chinese restrict them, according to The Week.

The result is that ultimately such a situation “leads to loss of control over these areas by India”, said the report.

Of the 65 patrol points, the presence was lost in PPs 5-17, 24-32, 37, 51, 52, and 62, according to the report cited by The Week.

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What’s the status of Ladakh stand-off after 4 years, are India & China nearing a breakthrough?