Lipulek dispute explainer

India and China have a long-standing border dispute along their Himalayan border which has erupted in violent skirmishes. But Indian and Chinese officials last week agreed to ignore Nepal’s own border dispute with India to facilitate trade.

The Indian Ministry of External Affairs this week flatly rubbished Nepal’s territorial claims to the Lipulek Pass and the Kalapani Region, including Limpiyadhura, which Nepal considers as the source of the Mahakali River that forms Nepal’s western border with India.

The latest episode in this dispute has come as Sino-Indian relations have thawed after US President Donald Trump slapped sanctions on Indian exports. The joint communiqué in Beijing said India and China had agreed to resume their border trade through the Nathu La, Sipki La and Lipulek during Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi’s visit to New Delhi.

Lipulek is a pass 10 km north-east of Kalapani which has been disputed ever since the Survey of India published its 1879 map, where the source of the Mahakali was suddenly shifted from Limpiyadhura to a spring at Kalapani. 

This tributary of the Mahakali was called the Kali on this map, and is a fordable tributary and not the main channel of the border river. The main Kali River was renamed Kuti Yangdi, and this happened while the British were still in India presumably to gain access to the Lipulek in contravention of the 1816 Sugauli Treaty. 

This subterfuge continued even after India gained independence in 1947. Nepal has maintained that the main channel of the Kali is the border as per the 1816 treaty, when Nepal lost a third of its territory to British India.

It is all well and good that India and China are now friendly enough to open border trade routes, but it should not be in violation of Nepal’s territorial integrity. Nepal should be called for diplomatic and political negotiations regarding the Lipulek pass and the Kalapani region comprising Limpiyadhura. 

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China and India, but especially the latter, should invite Nepal to discuss these issues and iron out the disputes based on facts and evidence and maps.

Nepal had sent seven diplomatic notes to India and three to China so far regarding the Lipulek and Kalapani. India has not responded to any of them. China replied once saying that Nepal and India should sort out their border disputes first before voicing their opinions.

Nepal welcomes the recent talks between India and China that it hopes will positively impact on settling border disputes that are mostly stalled since the 1962 Sino-Indian war, the 73-day military standoff over the disputed Doklam region between China and Bhutan, and the 2020 Galwan clash in Ladakh.

Nepal’s two large neighbours seem to have come to their senses and realised that it is in their interest to collaborate rather than confront each other when President Trump is acting erratically with threats of sanctions and tariffs. 

Prime Minister K P Oli should bring up Nepal’s grave concerns about the Lipulek during his state visit to India next month when he will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Bodh Gaya. The two are also expected to meet next week at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Tianjin when Chinese President Xi Jinping will also be present.

But even before that Nepal should send diplomatic notes to both the Indian and the Chinese governments regarding their agreement to resume border trade through the Lipulek. 

Here is a timeline of the developments regarding the Lipulek:

Sino-Indian Agreement of 1954

This 8-year Agreement on Trade and Exchange between Tibet and India was signed in Peking on 29 April, 1954 by the Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister Chang Han Fu and the Indian Ambassador Nedyam Raghavan. 

There was no explicit mention on the border settlements either on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) or on Ladakh, although trade and pilgrimage through Lipulek and other 5 passes (Sipki La, Mana Pass, Niti Pass, Kungri Bingri Pass and Dharma Pass) were agreed upon. 

Trade between Uttar Pradesh state and the Tibet Autonomous Region was through ‘border  point of the agreement states: ‘With a view to facilitating the visits of persons engaged in border trade and the exchange of commodities and means of transportation, (India and China) have decided that Lipulek (Qiangla) be the border pass for the entrance and exit of the said persons, commodities and means of transportation from the two sides.’

The agreement expired on 6 June 1962 during the Sino-Indian war, and the two sides did not renew it. Bilateral ties started to normalise only in the 1990s with the Indian decision in 1988 to abandon its policy of settling ‘territorial issue’ for ‘normalisation of relations’. India

There was no reaction from Nepal to the 1954 agreement since Nepal did not have diplomatic relations with China yet at the time.

Sino-Indian Agreement of 2005

The Political Parameters and the Guiding Principles for the Settlement of the Sino-Indian Boundary Question is detailed in 11 Articles, which outline the steps to be taken for a Peaceful and Tranquil Border. The agreement was a direct outcome of the Special Representatives mechanism that had been set up through a 2003 agreement. It also incorporated the Confidence Building Measures in Military Field along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Sino-Indian Border Areas signed in 1996. 

A protocol on Modalities for the Implementation of Confidence Building Measures in the Military Field along the Line of Actual Control in the India-China Border Areas signed during Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao’s India visit, which stated in Clause 2 of Article 5: ‘Both sides agree to extend in principle to expand the mechanism of border meeting points to include Kibithu Dhamal in the Eastern Sector and Lipulek Pass (Qing La) in the Middle Sector. The precise locations of these border meeting points will be decided upon mutual consultations.’

Nepal’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement in 2005 stating that Nepal had asked China about the issue and the Chinese Embassy clarified that the agreement had nothing to do with Kalapani. This was perhaps the first time that Nepal had objected to the Sino-Indian agreement on Lipulek.

King Gyanendra had staged a coup d’état on 1 February 2005, just two months prior to this agreement. The Nepali press voiced criticism of China in particular for disregarding the country’s sentiment. 

Sino-Indian Agreement of 2015

India and China signed several documents during the state visit of Chinese President XI Jinping to India on 18 September 2011. Number one on the list was: ’Opening a New Route for Indian Pilgrimage (Kailash Mansarovar Yatra) to the Tibet Autonomous Region of the People’s Republic of China’. 

The Indian foreign ministry stated: ‘The MoU provides for conducting the annual Kailash Mansarovar Yatra through Nathula Pass in Sikkim in addition to the existing Lipulek Pass in Uttarakhand’.

On May 15, 2015, China and India issued a Joint Statement during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to China. Point 28 under the ‘Trans-border Cooperation’, states that the two sides agreed to ‘hold negotiation on augmenting the list of trades commodities, and expand border trade at Nathu La, Quingla/Lipulek Pass and Sipki La Pass’.

Nepal’s objection to the 2015 agreement was stronger than in 2005. Prime Minister Sushil Koirala called up Narendra Modi to express Nepal’s displeasure It was not until 2020 that Nepal’s Foreign Minister disclosed that ‘Nepal had expressed its disagreement in 2015 through separate diplomatic notes addressed to the governments of both India and China … including Lipulek Pass as a bilateral trade route without Nepal’s consent.’

The new political map of India published by the Survey of India in November 2019 that incorporated areas east of the Kali River including Kalapani as Indian territory sparked renewed public, and political, attention to the Mahakali dispute.

The Nepal government then countered by formally approving the publication of the new Political and Administrative Map of Nepal including all territories lying to the east of the Mahakali River on May 18, 2020. In June, the House of Representatives unanimously endorsed the second amendment to the Constitution of Nepal to update the country’s new political map in the national emblem.

Sino-Indian Consensus of 2024

A 6-point Consensus on Peace and Tranquility on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) was agreed on December 18, 2024 between the Special Representative of the People’s Republic of China, Wang Yi, and the Special Representative of the Republic of India, Ajit Doval. 

India has not denied that this is a consensus, while China made it clear that this was not a Joint Statement. This Consensus is in line with the 2005 agreement, and was agreed during the 23rd round of the Special Representatives talks held after a gap of five years aimed at restoring bilateral ties frozen because of the military standoff in Ladakh.

The agreement included: cross-border communication and cooperation, promoting the resumption of pilgrimages by Indians to Xizang, cooperation on crossborder rivers, and trade at the Nathu La Pass.

Nepal made no reaction to the statement despite Lipulek being the pilgrimage route for Mansarovar and Kailash. 

Prabhakar Sharma is a construction engineer and an international border expert who has worked as a survey engineer for the Cameroon-Nigeria border demarcation by the United Nations.