Seven years on, Xi returns to India for BRICS Summit, set to hold bilateral meet with Modi

New Delhi: The Chinese president, Xi Jinping, landed in New Delhi on Saturday for the 18th BRICS Summit – his first visit to New Delhi since 2014, though he attended BRICS in Goa in 2016 and an informal summit with the prime minister, Narendra Modi, in Mamallapuram, Tamil Nadu, in 2019. He was received at the airport by the minister of state, Jitin Prasada.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson, Randhir Jaiswal, welcomed Xi’s arrival in a post on X, saying India looked forward to constructive discussions as BRICS continued to advance cooperation and contribute to a more balanced, representative and multipolar world.

Xi departed Beijing on Saturday at Modi’s invitation, Xinhua reported. His delegation includes Cai Qi, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and director of its General Office, along with China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, who also sits on the Political Bureau.

The Mamallapuram summit in 2019 had aimed to ease border tensions and boost bilateral trade after the 2017 Doklam standoff. But after the Galwan Valley clash in 2020, tensions between the two countries spiralled, with several standoffs along the Line of Actual Control (LAC), and neither head of state had visited the other since.

Following the 2020 clashes, high-level engagement between Modi and Xi remained limited to multilateral platforms, as relations stayed tense on both military and diplomatic fronts. Initial contact was restricted to brief, informal exchanges – such as pull-aside conversations at the G20 in Bali in 2022 and the BRICS summit in Johannesburg in 2023 – aimed at addressing immediate border friction. The diplomatic ground shifted at the BRICS Summit in Kazan in October 2024, where a formal border agreement paved the way for the two leaders’ first structured bilateral meeting in five years. A second formal bilateral meeting followed in Tianjin, China, in August 2025.

This year’s summit, being held on September 12 and 13, brings Xi to India for the first time since the Galwan clash. The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and the Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, arrived in New Delhi on Friday.

The bilateral meeting between Modi and Xi will be closely watched, as the two countries have been making slow, calculated progress towards improving ties.

Suyash Desai, a non-resident fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia, said Xi’s visit was especially significant against the backdrop of the Galwan conflict. “With the renewed structural changes, both countries are looking at this as an opportunity to improve strained relations. However, we shouldn’t forget that the LAC has become a live border in the past decade, and these meetings wouldn’t change facts on the ground,” he said.

Desai added that while the visit was a good step forward, China remained India’s “biggest strategic adversary” and posed an immediate military threat. “This line of thought shouldn’t be forgotten,” he said.

Boundary diplomacy

Last month, the national security advisor (NSA), Ajit Doval, travelled to China to attend the 25th round of India-China Special Representatives’ talks on the boundary question with Wang on August 25, with the two reviewing border management, negotiations towards an eventual settlement and practical cooperation across the Himalayan frontier, RNA Media had earlier reported. Doval and Wang agreed to establish two additional military hotlines and create two new meeting points for senior commanders along the disputed frontier, expanding the channels available to prevent local incidents from escalating.

After the Special Representatives’ talks in Beijing, India and China held Corps Commander-level military talks in the eastern sector on Sunday and Monday, according to the Ministry of External Affairs. The meeting took place amid ongoing tensions in the Taksing area of the Upper Subansiri district of Arunachal Pradesh. It was the first time such talks had been held in the eastern sector. A similar mechanism already exists in the western sector as well.

The Indian delegation was headed by Lieutenant General Girish Kalia, commander of the 3 Corps, also known as the Spear Corps, headquartered at Rangapahar in Nagaland.

The first Senior Highest Military Commander-level flag meeting was held over two consecutive days at Wacha on the Indian side and Damai on the Chinese side in Arunachal Pradesh, on September 6 and 7, respectively, Jaiswal said at a press conference.

A day ahead of Xi’s arrival, China’s foreign ministry spokesperson, Mao Ning, told a media briefing in Beijing that BRICS was the key platform for solidarity among emerging and developing economies, guided by what she called the BRICS spirit of openness, inclusiveness and win-win cooperation. She said the grouping had grown into “a real force standing at the forefront of the Global South”.

On the India meeting, Mao said: “China and India are arranging for the bilateral meeting between President Xi and Prime Minister Modi. This will be the third year in a row for the two leaders to meet with each other, following their meetings in Kazan and Tianjin. China will work with India to act on the strategic guidance of the two leaders, handle bilateral relations from a strategic height and long-term perspective, step up communication, enhance cooperation, properly handle differences, and be friends enjoying good-neighborliness and partners helping each other succeed.”

Mao said China backed a common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable approach to security, and looked forward to working with fellow BRICS countries to resolve differences through dialogue.