From Chennai Centre for China Studies website:
The consistent claim of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has been that the then Central Government was not a party to both the Simla Convention (27 April 1914) and the subsequent separate British-Tibet Treaty (3 July 1914) which fixed the Tibet-India border and as such, the two agreements are “illegal and invalid” from the PRC’s point of view. It is also being seen that Beijing, both at official and academic levels, is continuing with its efforts to produce evidences to justify its perceptions about the two documents. A new trend is however being noticed in the recent period, in the form of unprecedented attention of China’s scholars exclusively to McMahon line and the Tibet-India Border fixed by the 3 July 1914 treaty. In that context, the question as to what is the significance of such a trend for the present stage in Sino-Indian relations, assumes importance. [Full Text]
D.S.Rajan is Director of the Chennai Centre for China Studies, Chennai, India. He was formerly Director, Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India.
