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Nehru once said that India and China working together could introduce an Asian golden age. The same thought was echoed by Singapore’s first prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew in saying that China with one wing and India with another could make the bird of Asia fly. We need to ask if the present leaders in China and India harbour any such thoughts. On the contrary, India and China have for past decades been locked in competition in South and Southeast Asia, largely to China’s advantage even among India’s closest neighbours.

It would be unrealistic to assess India and China in the weighing scales. Since the Nehru/Lee era, India and China have grown more distant with relations askew. China is a global power; India a global player. China looms large in India’s strategic planning; the converse is untrue. In trade, Indian’s exports to China are about $18 billion a year with imports being about $ 127 billion. Th total Chinese investment in India is $2.7 billion or 0.3% of total foreign inward investment – a miniscule figure for China that has $162 billion invested abroad. There are about 5-7,000 Chinese in India and perhaps 55,000 Indians in China, which includes Hongkong (with 45,000) and Taiwan. These are hardly figures that support a robust bilateral relationship.

India could have made common cause with China on multiple issues arising from the Iran war, but is restrained by Delhi’s outspoken affinity with the US and Israel, whom it will not criticise, though it openly expresses support for Gulf rulers against Iran’s strikes in retaliation for US/Israel’s blatantly illegal attack on Iran. China is more forthright but has fallen short, at least openly, in providing military support to Iran though it is a major buyer of Iranian crude, from which it derives 14% of its oil, or in condemning the US, specifically because President Trump is likely to visit China in mid-May with a trade settlement in the offing, and in general because China does not wish to confront the US frontally at this juncture.

China is believed to have played a part in bringing the US and Iran to negotiations at Islamabad in April, and Iran is happy to have China, along with a few other nations, play guarantor for any future peace agreement. India is not a party in these discussions and is basically missing in action due to its tilt towards the two illegal aggressors in this case.

Both India and China have greater interests in the GCC than in Iran. Due to US unilateral sanctions – which are illegal in international law – India has largely disengaged from Iran except for Chabahar. GCC supplies 42% and 31% of China’s crude and LNG. China has invested $70........

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