US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin"s visit to India last week, his first foreign visit after assuming office, was preceded by the first "Quad" summit. And Austin"s visit will be followed by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson"s visit to India to herald the United Kingdom"s post-Brexit foreign policy to be centred around the Indo-Pacific. Together these events not just endorse but also reflect India"s intensifying engagement with the United States-led Indo-Pacific strategy.

Among other issues, China-India border tensions in 2020 are cited as the reason for the accelerating drift in India"s worldview which otherwise remains woven around its twin doctrines of "multi-alignment" and "strategic autonomy"－new forms of its historic nonalignment policy.

Understandably, these events have caused concerns among China"s foreign policy analysts, especially among its India watchers.

However, recent Sino-Indian military disengagements on the border have raised hopes of India returning to its quintessential equilibrium in foreign policy. Most aptly, this "return" to equilibrium is expected to be reflected in Chinese leader"s much anticipated visit to India later this year to attend the BRICS summit.

Besides, with the novel coronavirus pandemic－which has claimed more than 2.72 million lives and triggered unprecedented anxieties across the world while also complicating Sino-Indian ties－beginning to recede, the new focus on vaccinations has revived the centrality of China"s supply of active pharmaceutical ingredients to India and how China has contributed to India becoming the "pharmacy of the world". Also, there are thousands of Indian students studying medicine in China and most of them are now gearing up to return to Chinese universities to continue their education and training.