India and China are locked in a bitter border standoff in eastern Ladakh since May. (Representational)
India on Tuesday dismissed claims by a Chinese professor stating that China was using microwave weapons to defeat Indian forces in an alleged border clash in the disputed Ladakh region.
According to Indian officials, China is seeding ''fake news'' about using microwave weapons, referring to a Beijing-based professor's assertion that Chinese forces ''turned the mountain tops into a microwave oven'' during a recent clash with India that allowed Beijing to recapture two key hilltops in the disputed border region, reported Washington Examiner.
"It's pure and poor psyops from China," said an Indian official.
The Indian Army issued a denial on Tuesday and noted that they remain in control of the high ground.
"The claims cited by these media reports are fake," a graphic tweeted by the Indian Army says. "No such incident has taken place in Ladakh."
According to Washington Examiner, the Beijing-based professor claimed that Chinese forces used the weapons in order to fight while honouring a decades-old agreement that the two nuclear-armed neighbours would not use firearms in the border disputes.
"In 15 minutes, those occupying the hilltops all began to vomit.... They couldn't stand up, so they fled. This was how we retook the ground," said Renmin University professor of international relations Jin Canrong, as per a UK newspaper.
The professor claimed that the attack took place on August 29, but the Indian official said that never happened.
"If they got us out of the heights, why is China still asking India to withdraw from these heights?" the source replied. "Our soldiers and tanks/equipment still there, and we have not moved down from heights."
Indian officials had acknowledged in early September that Chinese forces had taken a ''provocative'' step on August 29, however, the Chinese officials at the time seemed to acknowledge that India remained in control of the area, reported Washington Examiner.
"We urge India to strictly discipline its border troops, stop all provocations at once, immediately withdraw all personnel who illegally trespassed across [the unofficial boundary of the disputed area], and stop taking any actions that may escalate tensions or complicate matters," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in early September.
It is not clear why the Chinese professor would make such a claim.
"It could either be just bravado or the platform to use to launch the psyops," the Indian official said.
The Chinese and Indian troops are engaged in a stand-off since early May along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh.
The situation along the LAC deteriorated in June following the Galwan Valley clash in which both sides suffered casualties.
Twenty Indian soldiers were killed in the line of duty in the violent face-off on June 15-16. It happened as a result of an attempt by the Chinese troops to unilaterally change the status quo during the de-escalation in eastern Ladakh.