Ladakh: Between Melting Glaciers and Strategic Crossroads

Ladakh today stands at the heart of India’s most complex challenge where domestic discontent meets geopolitical competition. As the region struggles with melting glaciers, unemployment, and growing demands for autonomy, the shadow of the China–Pakistan nexus looms large. For India, maintaining peace in Ladakh is no longer just an internal matter; it is central to balancing its foreign policy and securing its northern frontier.

Ladakh’s fragile peace began to unravel in August 2019, when the revocation of Article 370 separated it from Jammu and Kashmir and placed it under direct central rule. For some, it promised development; for others, it signalled the loss of autonomy and a threat to Ladakh’s cultural and ecological identity. Discontent soon grew over land rights, employment, demographic shifts, and environmental decline.

The turning point came with Sonam Wangchuk’s mobilization for statehood and Sixth Schedule safeguards. His campaign transformed local anxieties into a region-wide movement, culminating in Ladakh’s worst violence in decades. What began as a demand for constitutional protection has become a cry for recognition, leaving four dead and dozens injured as Leh went under curfew.

To understand this unrest, one must begin not with politics, but with the mountains themselves.

The Third Pole Melts

Ladakh’s unrest cannot be understood in isolation from its ecological context. The region forms a vital part of the Hindu Kush–Himalayan (HKH) ecosystem often called the planet’s “Third Pole.” Here, glaciers from the Karakoram and Zanskar ranges merge with those of the greater Himalayan arc, feeding the Indus, Sutlej, and Shyok rivers that sustain millions downstream. Acting as Asia’s water tower, this ecosystem is among the most climate-vulnerable zones on Earth, and Ladakh sits at its heart.

Assessments by ICIMOD reveal that glaciers in the HKH melted 65 percent faster between 2011 and 2020 than in the previous decade. If current trends persist, these glaciers could lose up to 80 percent of their volume by 2100 — a transformation that would upend water security, agriculture, and energy systems across South and Central Asia. For a region already described as a “cold desert,” such transformation is existential. Ladakh thus stands not just at India’s northern frontier but at the epicentre of a global ecological crisis.

Traditional livelihoods built on barley farming and livestock are collapsing. Outmigration is surging. The Periodic Labour Force Survey (2023–24) places Ladakh’s unemployment rate at 21.9%  nearly seven times the national average. Among youth, it climbs to 33.6 percent, and among women, it touches a staggering 45,2%. For many young Ladakhis, ecological fragility and economic precarity are inseparable realities.

The demand for autonomy is therefore not just political; it is ecological and existential. For Ladakhis, the Sixth Schedule represents a constitutional guarantee that their land, forests, and community resources will not be subjected to extractive development models imposed from outside. Their call is not for privilege, but for protection.

Promises and miscalculations

This raises a crucial question: why has the BJP government, elected on a manifesto promising inclusion under the Sixth Schedule and the restoration of statehood, grown reluctant to fulfil those very promises?

New Delhi’s hesitation appears driven less by neglect and more by calculation. Over the past year, executives from nearly twenty major solar power companies have visited Leh to assess potential sites for a 7,500-megawatt project worth ₹45,000 crore. Firms such as Siemens, ABB, Tata Power Solar, and Adani Green Energy have shown keen interest, drawn by one crucial factor: assured land availability. For Delhi, granting autonomous control over land could complicate large-scale development projects aligned with national energy goals.

Moreover, in a militarily sensitive frontier bordering China and Pakistan, granting legislative powers over land and resources could dilute the Centre’s grip over acquisition, infrastructure, and defence logistics all vital to India’s national security. Central control has therefore become both politically and strategically significant. Yet this reluctance to accommodate Ladakh’s political aspirations has opened strategic windows of opportunity for other states, challenging India’s internal and external deterrence.

At the Crossroads of Geopolitics

The region lies at a tri-junction, where geography, ecology, and geopolitics converge. Recent surveys by the Geological Survey of India (GSI) near Hanle, have revealed promising concentrations of rare earth elements, essential for technologies ranging from lasers to nuclear batteries. Earlier studies also found uranium content near Udmaru in the Nubra Valley, close to the Line of Actual Control (LAC). These discoveries add a new layer to Ladakh’s geostrategic value.

As the world’s largest consumer and processor of rare earths, China would see any delay in India’s mineral exploration as a strategic advantage. Unrest in Ladakh thus has consequences far beyond its borders. Instability in the region weakens India’s posture along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) and distracts from the broader Sino-Pak axis. China’s interest in Ladakh is neither recent nor reactive. Its strategic gaze toward this frontier dates to the 1950s, when it first staked territorial claims.

Ladakh’s strategic centrality also stems from the broader Sino-Pak nexus. China’s deepening partnership with Pakistan through the $60 billion China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) amplifies the stakes. The China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), running from Xinjiang through Pakistan-occupied Kashmir to Gwadar, gives Beijing direct access to the Indian Ocean. Yet it remains vulnerable: India’s control over the Karakoram range gives it potential leverage to disrupt CPEC’s northern arteries in a conflict scenario. Beijing’s long-standing push for territorial depth in Ladakh, reflected in repeated transgressions and the deadly Galwan clash of 2020 — is partly aimed at securing this corridor.

In this larger geopolitical theatre, the alienation of Ladakh’s local population becomes more than a domestic concern. It becomes a strategic liability. As former army officer and analyst Ajai Shukla has observed, “These are extremely delicate areas. This is not a situation that can be exploited for narrow political gains. It demands mature, sensitive handling because unrest in Ladakh must be understood through a three-front lens: India, Pakistan, and China.”

If tensions persist, India may not lose Ladakh by invasion but through alienation, the slow erosion of local trust that undermines internal stability from within. Such instability would not remain confined to Ladakh; it could ripple across Kashmir, deepening regional volatility. If New Delhi continues to view Ladakh primarily through the lens of territory and troop movement, it risks losing something far more consequential: the trust of its own citizens.

By: Mehak Fayaz, Naveed Ahmad

The authors are associated with University of Kashmir and have featured their research articles in various newspapers.