Junior minister Kiren Rijiju broke from the usual BJP mould of sweeping categorisations and provided a nuanced explanation for entry by the Chinese forces into Indian territory. These were instances of transgression and not of incursion, he explained. Last month, New Delhi rapped Uttarakhand Chief Minister Harish Rawat on the knuckles when he described the camping of Chinese soldiers as an incursion. Rawat soon recanted, describing the incident as a transgression. But before the Modi government was swept into office, its parliamentarians were routinely railing against the government of the day for the Chinese forces’ entry into India. Most of the time, the word they used was incursion. Pray, what has changed to warrant this sophistry?On its part, China too is putting its best foot forward. It dispatched its envoy on South China Sea for a discussion with South Block mandarins while its media have suggested that the “door is still open” for India’s entry into the Nuclear Suppliers Group. This is also totally out of place with Chinese behaviour, especially after India laid the blame for the failure of the Modi-led diplomatic exertions to enter the NSG on Beijing’s door. Both countries are putting their best foot forward because they will host two high-level summits.India needs an acquiescing China at the BRICS summit at Goa to take forward talks regarding the BRICS Bank. India needs huge dollops of investment to build its infrastructure and has decided on a high debt model to achieve the aim. China must keep India in good humour at the G-20 summit at Hangzhou, where they must put up a united front in insisting that the West honours its promise of putting up $100 billion to combat climate change and make the Bretton Woods more democratic. The truce will be temporary because their strategic interests put them on a collision course, be it the South China dispute, the China-Pakistan economic corridor or the border separating them. With new combinations shaping up in the Middle-East and South East Asia, both countries need nimble diplomatic footwork to seize the chances without stepping on the other’s toes.