India counters China's 'map war', assigns official names to 27 Arunachal sites

India ahs onsistently rejected Beijing's practice of assigning Chinese names to places in Arunachal Pradesh, describing the exercise as "vain and preposterous". India has maintained that such actions do not change the "undeniable" fact that the state "was, is, and will" remain an integral part of the country. Several of the newly marked locations hold strategic importance because of their proximity to the Line of Actual Control (LAC).