Ahmedabad: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Monday reaffirmed the ministry’s comments on China’s attempt to rename several places in Arunachal Pradesh, calling it “senseless” and emphasised that by doing it repeatedly, it is still senseless.

Speaking at a press conference in Ahmedabad, Gujarat on Monday, Jaishankar reasserted that the Ministry of External Affairs rightly called it senseless.

“I think we rightly called it senseless. By doing it repeatedly, it is still senseless. So I want to be very clear. Arunachal Pradesh was, is, and will always be India,” he said.

While expressing his stance, he hoped that his message would be clear not only in the country but beyond the country too.

“I hope I am saying it so clearly that not only in the country but beyond the country also, people get that message very, very clearly,” Jaishankar emphasised.

The Ministry of External Affairs on Tuesday firmly rejected China’s attempt to rename several places in Arunachal Pradesh saying assigning invented names will “not alter the reality that the state will always be an integral and inalienable part of India.”

China has persisted with its senseless attempts to rename places in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh. We firmly reject such attempts. Assigning invented names will not alter the reality that Arunachal Pradesh is, has been, and will always be an integral and inalienable part of India,” MEA official spokesperson, Randhir Jaiswal said in an official statement.

While addressing another press conference in Gujarat on Monday, Jaishankar said, “If today I change the name of your house, will it become mine? Arunachal Pradesh was, is and will always be a state of India. Changing names does not have an effect.”

China has recently released a list of 30 places in Arunachal Pradesh in a bid to assert its claim over India’s north-eastern state. India has been rejecting such renaming of places by China.

According to a March 30 report in its state-run Global Times, the Chinese Ministry of Civil Affairs released a fourth list of standardized geographical names in Zangnan, the name that China uses for Arunachal Pradesh.

According to the official website of the ministry, 30 additional publicly used place names in the Zangnan region have been officially revealed, the Global Times report said.

The Chinese Civil Affairs Ministry released the first list of the so-called standardised names of six places in Zangnan in 2017, while the second list of 15 places was issued in 2021 followed by another list with names for 11 places in 2023.

However, India has repeatedly rebuffed such attempts by China to rename places in Arunachal Pradesh.