Honorable Ms. Weng Tiehui, Vice Minister of Education of China

Distinguished judges and candidates,

Dear teachers，students and friends,

Namaste!

It is my great pleasure to attend the “Chinese Bridge” Chinese Proficiency Competition as well as the award ceremony today. On behalf of the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in India, I would like to extend my warmest congratulations to the 10 outstanding Indian university students, who have reached the finals and won awards today. Special congratulations go to Gao Xingfu for obtaining the championship.

Our finalists today were selected through a series of preliminaries. Some schools even held internal competitions. To make it to the final was not only the hard work of the contestants, but also the dedication of the teachers and the support from the headmasters. I would like to salute those who teach Chinese and spread Chinese culture in India, and the headmasters and heads of institutions supporting Chinese language education.

After watching the video of the preliminaries, and especially the on-site competition, we could feel the charm of “Chinese Bridge” and appreciate the enthusiasm of the students in learning Chinese and their passion for Chinese culture. I believe that with the joint efforts of all of us, Chinese education in India will open up new horizons, and the mutual learning between Chinese and Indian civilizations will be carried on from generation to generation.

Friends,

President Xi Jinping not long ago proposed the Global Civilization Initiative, advocating the respect for the diversity of civilizations, the strengthening of international people-to-people exchanges and cooperation, and jointly advancing the progress of human civilizations.

As two ancient civilizations next door to each other, mutual learning and friendly cooperation have always been the mainstream in the thousands of years history of exchanges between China and India. China’s paper making, silk, porcelain and tea were introduced to India, while Indian singing and dancing, astronomy, architecture and spices were brought to China. Buddhism originated in ancient India, and was introduced into China, where it carried forward, then spread to Japan, Korean Peninsula, Southeast Asia and other places. The Chinese word “刹那” is derived from the Sanskrit word “Kshan”. The Chinese word for tea is “茶”, it is called Chay in Hindi, which has very similar pronunciation. The two great civilizations of China and India have been interacting and promoting each other throughout thousands of years of history, making a profound impact on the process of human civilization.

As major developing countries and important emerging markets, both China and India are committed to achieving national development and modernization goals and shoulder major responsibilities in promoting world economic recovery, improving global governance and addressing global challenges. Our common interests far outweigh our differences. The two countries are neighbors that cannot be moved away. As the saying goes, “a close neighbor can be more helpful than a distant relative”. It is normal for neighbors to have differences. The key is to properly handle differences and find a solution through dialogue. The Chinese side has always viewed and handled China-India relations from a strategic and long-term perspective and is committed to implementing the important consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries that“China and India should not be a threat to each other, but an opportunity for each other’s development”, and “be cooperation partners to each other instead of being competitive rivals”. It is hoped that the Indian side can work with China in the same direction to strengthen communication, properly handle differences, advance exchanges and cooperation in various fields, pursue a new path of living in harmony, peaceful development and common revitalization between neighboring major countries, so as to make greater contributions to regional peace, stability and development.

Friends,

Language is a bridge of cultural exchanges and a key to opening each other’s hearts. As China and India have the largest number of young people in the world, learning Chinese and mastering it means that more youth from the two countries will have the opportunity to become friends. Through this “Chinese bridge” that connects the world, the young people of India can better understand the long-standing and profound Chinese civilization, better understand China, introduce China to each other, and renew friendship, thus contributing to the friendly relationship between China and India. I believe that more and more youth in India will learn Chinese inspired by you. The Chinese Embassy and Consulates-General in India will continue to provide more platform for Indian friends to learn Chinese, facilitate their further studies in China, and help deepen their exchanges, in a bid that they can serve as bridges of communication and messengers of friendship between the two countries.

Finally, we congratulate the winners once again and wish our Indian winners the best of luck in the global finals! 

Thank you!