China hands five youths of Arunachal Pradesh after ten days of missing.

Ten days after they crossed the border during an expedition to search and collect medicinal herbs, the Chinese authorities handed over five young people from Arunachal Pradesh to India on Saturday, officials of the Indian Army reported.

“After completing all the requisite formalities, the Indian Army took over all five individuals in Kibithu on September 12 2020,” Lieutenant Colonel Harsh Wardhan Pande, PRO (Defence) based in Tezpur, Assam, said in a statement.

“The persons will now be quarantined in compliance with the Covid-19 protocol for 14 days and eventually handed over to their family members,” it said.

This was, according to the Army, the third instance of Arunachal Pradesh youth living along the Indo-China border unintentionally straying to the other side of the line of actual control (LAC) during “adventurous forays.”

“The Indian Army has always been involved in finding the locals missing and helping them to get back home. In the current year three such incidents took place in Upper Subansiri and district of West Siang including the latest one, “the release said.

“All such individuals were safely brought back home after the Indian Army’s continuous efforts and cooperation in the past,” it added.

On September 2 in Upper Subansiri district, on the Indian side of the McMohan line bifurcating Arunachal Pradesh and Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) of China, the five youths from the Tagin tribe, used to serve as porters for the Indian Army, had gone absent.

Following their disappearance, a brother of one of the missing youths posted on social media that they had been ‘abducted’ by PLA. 

The same accusation made by Tapir Gao, BJP MP from Arunachal East, and Congress MLA from Pasighat Ninong Ering in their tweets.

The People’s Liberation Army had told Tuesday in response to a hotline message sent by the Indian Army that the youth found on the Chinese side, and their condition was good.

The youth’s disappearance and PLA’s accusation of their ‘abduction’ had contributed to the increased friction between the two countries.

Chinese state partner Global Times tweeted on Monday quoting a spokesperson for the Chinese foreign ministry Zhao Lijian. “China has never recognised the so-called ‘Arunachal Pradesh,’ which is the area of southern Tibet in China, and we do not yet have any information on the issue of the Indian Army sending a message to the PLA about five missing Indians in the region.”