The Beijing Winter Olympics drew a frosty reception in India on Wednesday after a Chinese soldier involved in a deadly Himalayan skirmish took part in the traditional torch relay.

Qi Fabao, a regiment commander for the People's Liberation Army, was tasked with overseeing troops involved in a high-altitude clash between Indian and Chinese soldiers in the Galwan Valley, which is disputed between the world's two most populous nations.

Troops fought a brutal hand-to-hand battle that left at least 20 Indians and four Chinese soldiers dead, though it took Beijing eight months to acknowledge the casualties on its own side.

China's Global Times state media outlet feted Qi - who sustained a serious head injury during the fighting - as a 'hero' after reporting his inclusion among the Games' 1,200 torchbearers.

But Qi's reception was less warm among the compatriots of his Galwan Valley adversaries.

'China's aggressive information warfare continues,' Indian journalist Abhishek Bhalla wrote on Twitter.

'They took a while to announce their dead but now Qi Fabao... is a torchbearer.'

Immediately after the clash atop a high ridge on June 2020 in the Ladakh region's Karakoram Mountains, India announced it had lost 20 of its soldiers in the battle that saw fists, clubs, stones and other improvised weapons used to avoid a firefight.

China meanwhile refused for several months to acknowledge any casualties in the clash, only confirming months later they had lost four soldiers, although the number of Chinese soldiers who sustained serious injuries has been quoted as being much higher.