<div style="text-align: justify; "><span style="font-size: 1rem;">India on Friday lodged a strong protest with Beijing over the “deliberate and selective” blocking of three athletes from Arunachal Pradesh from participating in the Asian Games at Hangzhou even as the sports minister Anurag Thakur cancelled his scheduled visit to China over the development.</span><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Three women wushu players from Arunachal Pradesh, which is claimed by China, couldn’t travel to Hangzhou as they were unable to download travel documents from an official Chinese website. The rest of the wushu squad – comprising a total of 10 players – faced no such issues and boarded a flight on Wednesday for Hong Kong, from where they had a connecting flight to Hangzhou.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">This was the second time in about two months that the same three players were barred by Chinese authorities from a sports event in China.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“A strong protest has been lodged in New Delhi and Beijing against China’s deliberate and selective obstruction of some of our sportspersons,” external affairs ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Further, as a mark of our protest against the Chinese action, minister of information and broadcasting and youth affairs and sports of India has cancelled his scheduled visit to China for the games,” he said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Bagchi said Chinese authorities discriminated against some Indian sportspersons from Arunachal Pradesh in a “targeted and pre-meditated manner” by denying them accreditation and entry to the Asian Games.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">China’s action “violates both the spirit of the Asian Games and the rules governing their conduct, which explicitly prohibits discrimination against competitors from member states”, he said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Indian government reserves the “right to take suitable measures to safeguard our interests”, Bagchi said, without giving details.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The development comes at a time when India-China relations are at a six-decade low over the dragging military standoff on the Line of Actual Control (LAC). India has linked the normalisation of relations to the restoration of peace and tranquillity in the border areas.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“In line with our long-standing and consistent position, India firmly rejects differential treatment of Indian citizens on the basis of domicile or ethnicity. Arunachal Pradesh was, is and will always remain an integral and inalienable part of India,” Bagchi pointed out.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">China claims Arunachal Pradesh as “south Tibet” and recently announced a list of its own names for locations and geographic features in the strategic border state. Arunachal Pradesh was also depicted within China’s borders in a “standard map” released recently by Beijing. The map was rejected by India and several other countries.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The three wushu players – Nyeman Wangsu, Onilu Tega and Mepung Lamgu – received their accreditation cards, which also act as an entry visa from the Hangzhou Asian Games Organising Committee (HAGOC). The athletes were required to download their travel documents, which would to be validated upon arrival in China.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">However, the three players could not download their travel documents.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Once the athletes received the accreditation cards from the organising committee, it meant that they have been cleared to travel for the Asian Games. But surprisingly, only these three players could not download their documents and they could not board the flight,” said an Indian official.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In the last week of July, the same players could not compete at the World University Games in Chengdu (July 18-Aug 8) because they were given stapled visas by China.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Stapled visas are meant to indicate that China doesn’t recognise India’s sovereignty over Arunachal Pradesh. India has consistently rejected China’s claim that the northeastern state is a disputed territory.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The eight-member Indian wushu team had then withdrawn from the event in Chengdu in protest.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The three wushu players also recently met cabinet minister Kiren Rijiju and requested him to look into the issue. HT</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd24/kh</div>