China-India relations thaw but no major reset yet

AllAfrica

2 days ago

After more than three years, China's top diplomat and Politburo member Wang Yi visited New Delhi this week for the 24th round of India-China Special Representative talks.
The last round took place in December 2019, but the Galwan Valley clashes in June 2020 brought the dialogue to a halt. Talks resumed only in December 2023 in Beijing, following a Narendra Modi–Xi Jinping meeting in Kazan, Russia, in October that year.
This visit contrasted starkly with Wang's trip to India in April 2022. Then, India gave him a lukewarm reception, largely because he had come directly from Islamabad and made contentious remarks on Kashmir at the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. There was even speculation at the time about whether he would proceed to New Delhi at all.
Now, the tone has shifted, reflecting a cautious and potentially ground-breaking recalibration in India–China relations amid Trump's tariff tantrum toward India. The Kazan meeting between Modi and Xi appears to have created space for tentative re-engagement and a recalibration of ties.
Moves were afoot even before Trump's tariff tantrum toward India. In June, India's defense minister and national security advisor visited China, followed by External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar's trip to Beijing in July.
That bilateral momentum will build when China hosts and Modi attends the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Tianjin this month. Significantly, it will mark the first time Modi has traveled to China since 2018.
Still, calling this a full China-India 'reset' might overstate the reality while deep-seated mistrust lingers. What's unfolding is better seen as a cautious inclination toward cooperation in sectors where both nations see mutual benefit — and strategic necessity — in easing tensions amid a turbulent global landscape shaped by Trump's tariff-induced trade frictions and rising geopolitical uncertainty.
Wang's inability to meet Modi in March 2022 symbolized the frost between the two sides at the time. But much has changed since. China has recently eased curbs on exports of fertilizers, rare earth minerals, magnets and tunnel-boring machines — all vital inputs for India's manufacturing and infrastructure sectors.
India, in turn, has relaxed visa policies for Chinese nationals, reopened limited border trade and begun engaging with select Chinese firms to secure supply chain components needed for its domestic production goals.
New Delhi's push for 'Make in India' manufacturing self-reliance depends, in part, on access to Chinese industrial inputs. Beijing, meanwhile, may see an opportunity to leverage tensions in India's ties with the US, aiming to tilt New Delhi away from Washington and reinvigorate the Russia–India–China strategic triangle.
This pragmatism reflects mutual recognition of tactical and strategic leverage points. Indian establishment voices in policymaking circles have increasingly urged joint ventures with Chinese firms that hold dominant global positions in manufacturing and supply chains.
To be sure, the bilateral thaw is delicate and tentative. Symbolic gestures — resuming direct flights, reopening the Kailash–Mansarovar pilgrimage and loosening investment restrictions — suggest movement toward normalized ties.
Yet key irritants persist, including lack of data-sharing on Himalayan rivers, the unresolved issue of the Dalai Lama's reincarnation and, perhaps most crucially, China's strategic axis with Pakistan.
While both sides speak of stabilizing borders and how the Xi-Modi meeting last year in Kazan created a 'new environment' for diplomacy, their disputed 3,488-kilometer border means the peace is still fragile and tentative.
For India, Modi's Atmanirbhar Bharat (self-reliant India) vision is a key driver. Unlike past Soviet-style licensed production, India today seeks technology transfers to build its manufacturing base.
But Chinese companies, like others, will tightly control how much technology crosses borders — and under what conditions. Some joint initiatives are emerging, but asymmetry in economic and technological power remains.
India, for its part, wants to diversify its technology and investment sources without becoming overly dependent on either China or the US.
And while Beijing may seek to prevent India from drifting too far into US-led geopolitical and supply chain initiatives, their diplomatic-economic-strategic balancing act remains delicate.
India continues to see China's close relationship with Pakistan as a limiting factor in bilateral ties.
China supplies more than 80% of Pakistan's defense imports and offered intelligence support, including live inputs, during recent India–Pakistan clashes. Wang's scheduled trip to Islamabad after New Delhi — to co-chair the sixth Pakistan–China Strategic Dialogue and review the status of the Belt and Road Initiative-driven China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)— underscored this reality.
New Delhi also recognizes that Beijing may quietly welcome the recent and significant strain in US–India relations. Despite foundational defense agreements and the Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies (iCET), Washington remains hesitant to share advanced technologies with India.
The Trump administration's renewed protectionist measures, not least his 50% punitive tariff on India over its purchase of sanctioned Russian oil, have made top-tier US tech-sharing even less likely.
Wang put the dispute in a broader global context, warning that the world faces 'a once-in-a-century transformation at an accelerating pace,' and must resist 'bullying' tactics — a not-so-veiled critique of Washington that aimed to pull India more deeply into the expanding BRICS bloc of middle powers.
Jaishankar echoed a shared call for 'reformed multilateralism,' positioning India and China as powers aligned on global governance, even as their bilateral irritants remain unresolved.
Wang's meeting with Modi also laid the diplomatic groundwork for the Indian leader's upcoming China visit, marking perhaps the most consequential upshot of the Chinese envoy's visit.
Symbolism — resumed flights, pilgrimage access and border calm — may help restore public perceptions of China-India normalcy. Substantive issues — minerals, joint ventures and tech transfer — will likely evolve more cautiously.
Still, this week's diplomacy showed that, despite rivalry, both nations are exploring ways to coexist and cooperate in the fractured global order driven by Trump-era tariffs and 'America First' nationalism. It's for now a modest ambition, but in today's world, modesty itself is an achievement.