India and China, two of the oldest yet living civilizations had a glorious history of cultural and material exchanges. For over tow millennia, numerous ties have linked India and china in various domains. The famous silk road reminds us of the fabulous and touching stories, as also the perilous journeys carried out by scholar monks like Fa Xian, Xuan Zang from the Chinese side and Kumarajiva, Bodhidharma and many others from the Indian side over the towering mountains, scorching deserts and storming seas. It was the history of mutual learning and development, if Buddhism from India enriched the Chinese culture, the Chinese traditional culture equally left its imprint in India. It was this cultural cousinhood that developed into friendship and subsequently into camaraderie during first half of the twentieth century when both India and China fought western imperialism. It is owing to serious misconceptions that the relations deteriorated in the late 1950s that culminated into a brief armed conflict in 1962, and remains under the shadow of mutual distrust.
