New Delhi /June, 18 :All Indian soldiers involved in the deadly clash with China at Galwan Valley in Ladakh on Monday are accounted for, army sources were quoted as saying by NDTV said Thursday.
Twenty soldiers including a Colonel were killed in the line of duty. Though Beijing has given no official figure, army sources say at least 45 Chinese soldiers were killed or injured.
Some Indian soldiers are still recovering at a hospital in Ladakh but more information on this is not being disclosed until the army declares that it is safe to do so.
In the violent face-off which took place at nearly 15,000 feet up in the Himalayas near the freezing Galwan River, soldiers were attacked with iron rods, rocks wrapped in barbed wire and nail-studded clubs. Some soldiers fell off a steep ridge into the icy river.
Hours after confirming on Tuesday that three soldiers including the Colonel were killed, the army said 17 more critically injured soldiers were “exposed to sub-zero temperatures” and died of their injuries. Their sacrifice would not go in vain, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said yesterday, warning that India would give a fitting reply if provoked.
The clash took place near the Line of Actual Control, the de-facto border between India and China, at a point here called PP-14 or Patrolling Point 14.
Satellite images showed a massive Chinese build-up on their side of the LAC. Troops from this area likely surged to India’s areas in the Galwan Valley.
The Chinese were upset about India’s new road, which links Daulat Beg Oldie to the North with Darbuk to the South.
The incident “will have a serious impact on the bilateral relationship” and China must reassess its actions and take corrective steps, Foreign Minister S Jaishankar told his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi.
But the ministers agreed that “neither side would take any action to escalate matters” and both sides would implement the disengagement understanding of June 6, when top military officers held the first of many talks to defuse tension.
