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From Shahidula to the Tarim Basin the traveller had a choice of three passes, the Kilik (not to be confused with the Kilik Pass leading from the Hunza Valley to the north), the Kilian Pass and the Sanju; but the usual route for caravans in the 19th century was via the Sanju Pass.

The Kilik Pass was reportedly once frequently used by Balti merchants based in Yarkand and had plenty of fodder and fuel at every stage. It was said to be the easiest and shortest route, but merchants were not allowed to use it for political reasons. Travellers were also often prevented from accessing it for considerable periods during hot weather due to flooding of the Toghra about 14 km (8.7 mi) below Shahidula. After crossing the pass the route joined the Kugiar route at Beshterek, one day's march south of Karghalik.

Apparently, the Kilian was previously the most frequented pass, though it was little used in the 19th century except sometimes in the summer. It is higher than the Sanju Pass and also impractical for laden horses, but reportedly not so difficult to cross. The road then descends to the village of Kilian and, after two marches one reached Bora on the road between Sanju and Karghalik.

The Sanju, or Sanju-la, (5,364 m or 17,598 ft) was the last on a series of difficult passes on the most common summer caravan route between Ladakh and the Tarim Basin. This route led from the Nubra Valley in Ladakh across the ice-covered Sasser Pass (5,411 m or 17,753 ft) and the even higher Karakoram Pass (5,575 m 18,291 ft) and the relatively easy Suget Pass to the staging post at Shahidulla. From there in summer the caravans normally headed north across the Sanju Pass to modern Pishan/Guma in the Tarim Basin and then either northwest to Karghalik and Yarkand or northeast to Khotan.

After crossing the Sanju, the caravans descended to the village of Sanju from where a good road led 122 miles (196 km) to Yarkand, meeting up with the Kilian route at Bora and the Kilik and Kugiar routes at Karghalik.

The next morning, our road lay up a narrow winding gorge, northwards, with tremendous vertical cliffs on either hand. Dead horses were passed at every few hundred yards, marking the difficulties of the route. We took up our abode in a kind of cave, so as to save the delay of striking the tents in the morning. The following day, we started for the pass into Toorkistân. The gorge gradually became steeper and steeper, and dead horses more frequent. The stream was hard frozen into a torrent of white ice. The distant mountains began to show behind us, peeping over the shoulders of the nearer ones. Finally, our gorge vanished, and we were scrambling up the open shingly side of the mountain, towards the ridge.... The pass is very little lower than the rest of the ridge which tops the range. The first sight, on cresting the 'col,' was a chaos of lower mountains, while far away to the north they at last rested on what it sought, a level horizon indistinctly bounding what looked like a distant sea. This was the plain of Eastern Toorkistân, and that blue haze concealed cities and provinces, which, first of all my countrymen, I was about to visit. A step further showed a steep descent down a snow-slope, into a large basin surrounded by glaciers on three sides. This basin was occupied by undulating downs, covered with grass (a most welcome sight), and occupied by herds of yaks.

The summit of the pass is always covered with ice and snow and is not practically passable with laden ponies—yaks have to be used.

“The eastern (Kuenlun) range forms the southern boundary of Khotan”, and is crossed by other passes: the Sanju Pass near the town of Shahidulla, the Hindutash Pass, and the Yangi Pass , in the northern part of the Aksai Chin area in Ladakh . The Hindutash pass has been used historically as the point of entry into India Proper from the ancient Indian Kingdom of Khotan which only explains the literal meaning of the name Hindutash signifying border post . The Yangi was traversed in 1865 by W. H. Johnson of the Survey of India. W.H. Johnson’s survey established certain important points. "Brinjga was in his view the boundary post" ( near the Karanghu Tagh Peak in the Kuen Lun in Ladakh ), thus implying "that the boundary lay along the Kuen Lun Range". Johnson’s findings demonstrated that the whole of the Kara Kash valley was “ within the territory of the Maharaja of Kashmir” and an integral part of the territory of Kashmir . "He noted where the Chinese boundary post was accepted. At Yangi Langar, three marches from Khotan, he noticed that there were a few fruit trees at this place which originally was a post or guard house of the Chinese". “The Khan wrote Johnson ‘that he had dispatched his Wazier, Saifulla Khoja to meet me at Bringja, the first encampment beyond the Ladakh boundary for the purpose of escorting me thence to Ilichi’… thus the Khotan ruler accepted the Kunlun range as the southern boundary of his dominion.” According to Johnson, “the last portion of the route to Shadulla (Shahidulla) is particularly pleasant, being the whole of the Karakash valley which is wide and even, and shut in either side by rugged mountains. On this route I noticed numerous extensive plateaux near the river, covered with wood and long grass. These being within the territory of the Maharaja of Kashmir, could easily be brought under cultivation by Ladakhees and others, if they could be induced and encouraged to do so by the Kashmeer Government. The establishment of villages and habitations on this river would be important in many points of view, but chiefly in keeping the route open from the attacks of the Khergiz robbers.”

The Chinese completed the reconquest of eastern Turkistan in 1878. Before they lost it in 1863, their practical authority, as Ney Elias British Joint Commissioner in Leh from the end of the 1870s to 1885, and Younghusband consistently maintained, "had never extended south of their outposts at Sanju and Kilian along the northern foothills of the Kunlun Mountains. Nor did they establish a known presence to the south of the line of outposts in the twelve years immediately following their return". Ney Elias who had been Joint Commissioner in Ladakh for several years noted on 21 September 1889 that he had met the Chinese in 1879 and 1880 when he visited Kashgar. “they told me that they considered their line of ‘chatze’, or posts, as their frontier – viz. , Kugiar, Kilian, Sanju, Kiria, etc.- and that they had no concern with what lay beyond the mountains” i.e. the Kuen Lun range in northern Kashmir wherein the Hindutash pass is situate.

T.D. Forsyth who was entrusted with the rather unambiguous task of visiting the Court of Atalik Ghazi pursuant to the visit on 28, March 1870 of the envoy of Atalik Ghazi, Mirza Mohammad Shadi, stated that "it would be very unsafe to define the boundary of Kashmir in the direction of the Karakoram…. Between the Karakoram and the Karakash the high Plateau is perhaps rightly described as rather a no-mans land, but I should say with a tendency to become Kashmir property". Two stages beyond Shahidulla, as the route headed for Sanju, Forsyth’s party crossed the Tughra Su and passed an out post called Nazr Qurghan. “This is manned by soldiers from Yarkand”. In the words of John Lall, “Here we have an early example of coexistence. The Kashmiri and Yarkandi outposts were only two stages apart on either side of the Karakash river..." to the northwest of the Hindutash in the north eastern frontier region of Kashmir. This was the status quo that existed at the time of the mission to Kashgar in 1873-74 of Sir Douglas Forsyth. “Elias himself recalled that , following his mission to Kashgar in 1873-74, Sir Douglas Forsyth ‘recommended the Maharaja’s boundary to be drawn to the north of the Karakash valley as shown in the map accompanying the mission report’. Elias’ reasons for suggesting a boundary that went against the situation on the ground and the recommendations of Sir Douglas Forsyth, who had been directed by the Government of India to ascertain the boundaries of the Ruler of Yarkand, seem to have been prompted at least partly, by his ill-concealed contempt for the Ladakh Wazir’s plans”.This had been motivated by the discovery of a lapis lazuli mine near the Kashmiri outpost at Shahidulla by a Pathan from Bajaur, not a Kashmiri, as if the nationality of the finder had anything to do with the rights to the territory. Lapis lazuli, he pointed out, had no value at the time. “So the only reason for raising the question is a worthless one, and prompted only by "the usual Kashmiri greed for every thing they can lay hands upon".”

When the Government of Kashmir in 1885, at a time when the Chinese were least concerned or bothered of the alien trans- Kuen Lun areas in the highlands of Kashmir , beyond their eastern Turkistan dominion and literally “had washed their hands of it”, prepared to reunify Kashmir and the Wazir of Ladakh , Pandit Radha Kishen initiated steps to restore the old Kashmiri outpost at Shahidulla, Ney Elias who was British Joint Commissioner in Ladakh and spying on the Government of Kashmir raised objections. “This very energetic officer’, he wrote to the resident, who duly forwarded the letter to the Government of India, “wants the Maharaja to reoccupy Shahidulla in the Karakash valley ….I see indications of his preparing to carry it out, and, in my opinion, he should be restrained, or an awkward boundary question may be raised with the Chinese without any compensating advantage”. In the circumstances, since Elias had represented to the Supreme Government, it was a relatively simple matter for him to ensure that the plans were dropped. He told the Wazir that he had reported against the scheme to the Resident, and pretty soon the subservient Wazir succumbed and assured him that he did not intend to implement it. Elias was also promptly meticulously backed up by the Government of India. A letter dated 1 September was sent to the officer on Special Duty (as the Resident was called before 1885) instructing him to take suitable opportunity of advising His Highness the Maharaja not to occupy Shahidulla”. Elias had already killed the proposal. Kashmir, however never forfeited her territorial integrity, though she had been under duress and coercion prevented from restoring the outpost at Shahidulla to command the Kuen Lun.

The Chinese Karawal or outpost, of Sanju was at the northern base of the Kuenlun, three stages from the pass of that name. Nevertheless, F. E. Younghusband could not disguise the objective fact that the Chinese considered the Kilian and Sanju passes as the practical limits of their territory, although they "do not like to go so far as to say that beyond the passes does not belong to them….".

References

1. Report of a Mission to Yarkund in 1873 : vol.1, pp. 244-245. (1875). T. D. Forsyth. Calcutta.
2. Report of a Mission to Yarkund in 1873 : vol.1, p. 245. (1875). T. D. Forsyth. Calcutta.
3. Visits to High Tartary, Yarkand and Kashgar, pp. 132-133. (1871). Reprint by Oxford University Press (1984). ISBN 0-19-583830-0.
4. Report of a Mission to Yarkund in 1873 : vol.1, p. 245. (1875). T. D. Forsyth. Calcutta.
5. Gazetteer of Kashmir and Ladak compiled under the direction of the Quarter Master General in India in the Intelligence Branch. First Published in 1890
6. Himalayan Frontiers by Dorothy Woodman. Pg.67-68 , published inter alia by London Barrie and Rockliff The Cresset Press 1969.
7. Himalayan Battleground by Margaret W. Fisher, Leo E. Rose and Robert A. Huttenback, published by Frederick A. Praeger Pg.116.
8. Report of the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India, 1866, p.6.
9. Aksaichin and Sino-Indian Conflict by John Lall at pages 56-57, 59, 95, Allied Publishers Private Ltd, New Delhi.
10. For. Sec. F. October 1889, 182/197.
11. For. Pol.A. January 1871, 382/386, para58
12. Aksaichin and Sino-Indian Conflict by John Lall at pages57-58, 61,69 Allied Publishers Private Ltd, Nav Dehli
13. For. Sec. F.Pros. November 1885, 12/14(12)
14. Aksaichin and Sino-Indian Conflict by John Lall at page 60, Allied Publishers Private Ltd, New Delhi
15. Sec. F. November 1885,12/14(12)
16. For.Sec.F.Pros.October 1889,182/197(184)

• Trails to Inmost Asia: Five Years of Exploration with the Roerich Central Asian Expedition, pp. 49–51. (1931), George N. Roerich. First reprint in India. Book Faith India, Delhi. (1996) ISBN 81-7303-032-4.

• Mountain passes of China
• Mountain passes of the Himalaya
• Xinjiang
• Karakoram
• Sites along the Silk Road