On August 31, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Chinese President Xi Jinping and Cai Qi, secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Central Secretariat. In their talks, Xi underlined that, since their meeting at Kazan in 2024, Sino-Indian relations had “restarted on a new journey.” He stressed that the two countries should remain amicable neighbors and mutually enabling partners, working together to achieve the vision of a “dance of the dragon and the elephant.”
Modi, in turn, responded that China-India relations were returning to a positive trajectory: the border situation remained stable, direct flights were soon to resume, and the areas of consensus far outweighed the differences. At the same time, at the strategic level, both Modi and Xi emphasized the need for enhanced coordination in multilateral forums.
As Chinese scholar Lin Minwang observed, Sino-Indian relations are “like a fruit tree, with low-hanging fruits everywhere.” The immediate priority, he suggested, is “to pick the low-hanging fruits first.”
To reset their ties, at the Tianjin meeting, Xi and Modi affirmed their view of the two countries as “partners, not rivals,” and explicitly stressed that “the boundary question should not define the overall relationship.” This constituted the political premise and trigger for the reset.
Following the Modi-Xi meeting on the sidelines of the 2024 BRICS Summit in Kazan – the first formal exchange between the two in five years – the past year has seen phased disengagement and technical troop withdrawals at several points along the border, accompanied by strengthened communication mechanisms between the militaries and foreign ministries. The aim has been to confine “differences” within a manageable threshold, thereby preserving room for broader political and economic cooperation.
In mid-August 2025, the 24th Round of the Special Representatives’ Meeting on the Boundary Question produced a 10-point consensus, including the establishment of expert and working groups under the Working Mechanism for Consultation and Coordination on India-China Border Affairs, with a mandate to advance boundary negotiations in sectors where conditions are ripe, and to reinforce mechanisms for border management and de-escalation.
In Tianjin, the two leaders placed issues such as “trade, rare earths, and high-technology supply chains” on the agenda, reflecting a pragmatic prioritization of economic ties in the reset process. On the one hand, India’s manufacturing and renewable energy industries continue to rely heavily on intermediate goods, components, and critical materials from China. On the other hand, as China pursues diversification of its export markets, the vast Indian consumer market remains impossible to overlook. Even in the absence of fully restored political trust, the practical demand for economic cooperation may serve as an important stabilizing bond in bilateral relations.
Simultaneously, measures such as resuming direct flights, promoting business-to-business linkages, negotiating sectoral memoranda of understanding, and reinstating pilgrimage exchanges represent tangible means of converting political goodwill into commercial interaction and people-to-people connectivity.
Nevertheless, do the Tianjin meetings and engagements over the past year signify that Sino-Indian relations are genuinely entering a new phase of stable development? Or is it primarily a strategic recalibration to deal with the current global situation?
Chinese media and academia have generally pointed out that the pragmatic logic behind this “ice-breaking” visit lies in the Modi government’s effort to ease domestic economic pressures and external constraints, while tactically seeking strategic maneuvering space. For China, Modi’s visit represents both an opportunity to consolidate the momentum in bilateral ties over the past year and a test of how to manage the long-term dynamics of competition and cooperation.
China regards Modi’s return after seven years as a critical window for “restarting and relaunching”（重启再出发） Sino-Indian relations. According to Xinhua’s report on August 31, official Chinese statements framed the Tianjin meeting as a continuation of the consensus formed at the bilateral meeting at Kazan in 2024, highlighting that exchanges and cooperation between the two sides had “continued to make new progress.” The Tianjin meeting was intended to “further elevate” the relationship and steer it toward a new stage of sustained, sound, and stable development.
Zhang Shujian, an associate research fellow at the South Asia Institute of the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, argued that the meeting provided “a fresh opportunity for positive interaction” and marked a key period for translating the 10-point consensus reached at the August meeting of Special Representatives on the boundary question into concrete cooperation.
Despite increasing engagements China’s approach to India remains grounded in a sober realist perspective. From Beijing’s standpoint, India’s “pragmatic engagement with China” implies that the path to rebuilding mutual trust is one of both goodwill gestures and latent risks. As Xie Chao, research fellow at the South Asian Studies Centre of Fudan University, observed, India faces domestic tensions between pragmatists and hardliners, while its “balancing diplomacy” and “opportunistic impulses” remain intact.
Other commentaries further emphasized that India’s improvement of relations with China carries a “strategic” character, but does not erase its longstanding suspicions. Notably, in the joint statement issued with Japan shortly before the visit, Modi implicitly referred to China’s maritime activities. Chinese outlet The Paper took this as a sign that Beijing should not hold illusions about a genuine “strategic reorientation” on India’s part.