NEW DELHI: China has accused Indian media of playing in the hands of unnamed western countries by playing up the negative and ignoring the positive in Beijing’s ties with New Delhi, local reports said, quoting the Global Times, a paper favoured by the ruling communist party.

“While the Indian government is treating its relations with Beijing rationally, the country’s media and public opinion are busy stirring up negative sentiments. They tend to attach more attention to divergences while overstating contradictions between the two,” the paper said.

The article came against the backdrop of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s recent visit to New Delhi.

In an opinion piece titled, ‘Indian media should view Beijing-Delhi ties constructively’, the paper said the press on both sides should be cautious about attempts by the West to drive a “wedge” between the two countries.

Mr Yi visited India last week apparently to set the agenda for a BRICS summit India is to host in Goa shortly. As a number of media outlets reported, the tour was focused on cooperation over the upcoming G20 and BRICS summits, the op-ed article said. “However, quite a few Indian media started to cover the tour a week ago with the eye-catching headline, ‘China blocked India’s (NSG) Nuclear Supply Group bid, but now wants help on South China Sea’,” said the article.

“After negative hype over Sino-Indian ties by Indian media for a long time, it is not hard to envisage that they did it again this time. Yet while they grab all the attention they want like always, they have also caused a deterioration in the Indian public’s views of China,” the paper said.

The opinion piece, which could be relevant to the sorry state of affairs between India and Pakistan, said the view shown by the Indian media did not fairly represent the big picture of the Sino-India ties.

Published in Dawn, August 16th, 2016