NEW DELHI // As Narendra Modi’s first state visit to China begins on Thursday, the Indian prime minister is grappling with a host of concerns: fractious border issues, a vast trade deficit, Beijing’s proximity to India’s arch-rival Pakistan, and signs of strain Sino-Indian ties.
Mr Modi will start his three-day visit in Xi’an, the home province of president Xi Jinping. This gesture of reciprocity comes after Mr Xi began his own tour of India last September in Mr Modi’s home state of Gujarat.
Mr Modi is due to hold further talks with Mr Xi and other Chinese leaders in Beijing on Friday.
The two delegations are expected to sign trade and investment deals worth US$10 billion (Dh36.7bn), and to press forward on an agreement signed last year to build a $36bn high-speed rail link between Delhi and Chennai. Mr Modi will spend Saturday in Shanghai meeting Chinese business leaders and speaking at an India-China business forum. He is due to leave the country later that day, travelling to Mongolia and South Korea.
“The 21st century belongs to Asia,” Mr Modi said on Tuesday.
“I was waiting a long time for the China trip. I believe that my trip will ... set a new milestone for relations between developing countries in Asia as well as around the world.”
But Mr Modi’s optimism has been undermined by recent frictions in the relationship between the two countries.
Mr Modi’s visit to India’s north-eastern state of Arunachal Pradesh in February drew criticism from China which claims the territory as its own. The border dispute has festered for decades without any progress.
India’s foreign secretary, S Jaishankar, said on Tuesday that the two countries had held 18 rounds of talks on the issue but were yet to “reach a stage where there is finality”.
An op-ed piece published in the state-run Chinese newspaper Global Times that was published on Tuesday, accused Mr Modi of "playing little tricks" with the issue in a bid to "boost his domestic prestige while increasing his leverage in negotiations with China".
In the article, academic Hu Zhiyong said: “Modi has been busy strengthening India’s ties with neighbouring countries to compete with China, while trying to take advantage of the tremendous opportunities for economic development created by China.”
Sushant Singh, a New Delhi-based defence analyst, said the border dispute could be resolved if both sides compromised. India had to give up claims in the Aksai Chin region in eastern Jammu and Kashmir, he said, while China had to give up claims on Arunachal Pradesh.
“A road map for resolving this dispute” is crucial, Mr Singh added. “But the political climate in both countries doesn’t look suited to it. The status quo will prevail, unless Modi pulls off something dramatic and announces a headline-catching deal in Beijing.”
India has also expressed dissatisfaction over a $46bn deal signed last month by Pakistan and China to develop highways and other infrastructure projects. The projects are intended for a corridor that runs partly through land that India considers Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
"The matter has been taken up with the Chinese government through diplomatic channels," the Indian Express newspaper quoted Mr Jaishankar as saying. "It was taken up with the Chinese ambassador in Delhi and [it] was taken up by our ambassador in Beijing."
Gauri Khandekar, who heads the Asia programme at Fride, a policy think tank based in Madrid and Brussels, admitted that “knotty issues” existed between India and China. But she said Mr Modi was well-placed to deal with the challenges.
“China is not new to Modi,” Ms Khandekar said, pointing out that he had travelled there so many times during his three terms as chief minister of Gujarat, and that he had even printed out red business cards in Mandarin to hand out to those he met.
Ahead of his visit, Mr Modi also joined Sina Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, attracting tens of thousands of followers within hours.
“He has a certain degree of admiration for the Chinese and their achievements. The bonhomie between Modi and Xi is noteworthy.”
Ms Khandekar said Mr Modi will likely press for Indian participation in the Asian Infrastructure Bank, as well as lobby for more investment, along the lines of the $20bn in investment over five years that Mr Xi had promised during his visit to India in September.
But the projects for which this investment had been earmarked have stalled, in large part due to the Indian government’s difficulty in acquiring the necessary land. For instance, only a fifth of the land required for a $5bn industrial park in Pune has been acquired.
Meanwhile, the government has acquired less than a third of the land for a similar project worth $1.8bn in the town of Vadodara.
Despite this, the Chinese have a reputation for keenly studying the legal requirements for these projects, while Mr Modi is keen on cutting red tape, Ms Khandekar said, describing these factors as a “a promising combination for any future investment”.
“However, I would not pin too much [hope on] deals during this trip,” Ms Khandekar said, partly because “key agreements worth billions were signed during Xi’s visit, and this is an ongoing partnership, so it does not need firecrackers at every visit”.
ssubramanian@thenational.ae
