'Smooth and easy': India and China resume direct flights as ties improve

Passengers of the first direct flight between India and China in five years touched down on Monday, after Asia's giants lifted a long-term air travel suspension as they cautiously rebuild relations.

IndiGo flight 6E1703 from Kolkata touched down in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou shortly before 4:00 am (2000 GMT), officially resuming nonstop air links that had been suspended since 2020 due to the pandemic and subsequent geopolitical tensions.

IndiGo flight 6E1703 from Kolkata touched down in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou shortly before 4:00 am (2000 GMT), officially resuming nonstop air links that had been suspended since 2020 due to the pandemic and subsequent geopolitical tensions.

The neighbours and world's two most populous nations remain strategic rivals competing for regional influence, but ties have eased gradually since a deadly Himalayan border clash in 2020.

India's government said the resumption of flights will boost "people-to-people contact" and aid the "gradual normalisation of bilateral exchanges".

Passengers aboard the first flight — among them many Indians in search of cross-border business opportunities — told AFP in the Guangzhou airport about the convenience of the resumed links.

'I could come again and again'

"It was such a smooth and easy, lovable trip," said Rashika Mintri, a 44-year-old interior designer from Kolkata.

"I could come again and again," she said.

Warming relations with Beijing come as India's ties with key trade partner Washington falter, following US President Donald Trump's order imposing punishing 50 percent tariffs.

Trump's aides have accused India of fuelling Russia's war in Ukraine by buying Moscow's oil.

There are already regular flights between India and Hong Kong, while additional services from the capital New Delhi to Shanghai and Guangzhou will begin in November.

Abhijit Mukherjee, the captain of the flight that arrived Monday in Guangzhou, told AFP that without the new nonstop, passengers would need to travel through other airports, such as in Bangkok or Singapore.

"It adds up," the 55-year-old pilot said of the transfers.

But the direct flight he had just completed was "very smooth" he said, holding a bouquet of flowers presented to him upon arrival.

India's eastern port city of Kolkata has centuries-old ties with China dating back to British rule, when Chinese migrants arrived as traders. 

Indo-Chinese fusion food remains a beloved staple of the city's culinary identity.

"It's great news for people like us, who have relatives in China," said Chen Khoi Kui, a civil society leader in Kolkata's Chinatown district of Tangra. "Air connectivity will boost trade, tourism and business travel."

'First step'

India runs a significant trade deficit with Beijing, relying heavily on Chinese raw materials for industrial and export growth.

The thaw between New Delhi and Beijing followed meetings between their leaders in Russia last year and in China in August.

The resumption of direct flights is a "first step" in repairing ties, said passenger Athar Ali, a 33-year-old businessman from India, as he waited to check in for IndiGo's Monday flight returning the aircraft to Kolkata.

A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held at the check-in counter, where a long queue had formed for the first direct flight from mainland China to India since 2020.

Nonstop services between the two countries were suspended during the Covid-19 pandemic, halting roughly 500 monthly services.

Relations then plummeted after the 2020 border skirmish between the nuclear-armed nations, when at least 20 Indian and four Chinese soldiers were killed.

New Delhi responded by tightening restrictions on Chinese investments and banning hundreds of apps, including TikTok.

India then deepened ties with the US-led Quad alliance -- also including Japan and Australia -- aimed at countering China's influence in the Asia-Pacific.

Both sides have troops posted along their contested 3,500-kilometre (2,175-mile) high-altitude frontier.

But this month, soldiers on each side exchanged gifts of sweets on the Hindu festival of Diwali, "marking a gesture of goodwill", said Yu Jing, the spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy in India.

The Indian Express, in an editorial after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and China's President Xi Jinping met in August, said improving ties with Beijing "sends an appropriate signal" to Washington.

But relations still have far to go.

"Managing an increasingly assertive China remains India's long-term challenge," the newspaper added.