Japan to build India's first high-speed rail link amid warmer ties

India and Japan on Saturday reached a substantive agreement on a civil nuclear deal in the annual summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe here.

Charting a new course, India and Japan on Saturday announced a series of military and strategic agreements and understandings.

Running at speeds ranging from of 300km/h to 350km/h, the trains will cut down the travel time between the two cities from the current 7h to 2h. He also said that India is eager to introduce high speed train service in the Mumbai-Ahmedabad route with the help of Japanese rail technologies.

While China had in October played down Japan's presence in the naval drills saying Beijing was "not that fragile" and had "sound relations" with both India and the U.S., the Chinese Foreign Ministry struck a different tone on Monday, warning "relevant countries" to not "provoke confrontation". Under the defence deals, the two sides will share technology, equipment and military information, but the long-awaited sale of Japanese aircraft in a deal worth about $1.1 billion could not be concluded.

After Modi-Abe talks, the two countries signed a broadbased MoU for cooperation in civil nuclear energy with the final pact to be signed after certain technical and legal issues are thrashed out.

PM Abe said that a strong India was in japan's interest.

"Tokyo will want some kind of commitment from India that it will not conduct a nuclear test. But India will have concerns about its strategic autonomy being curbed if it agrees to conditionalities", said Lalima Varma, professor of Japanese studies at New Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University.

The high-speed railway project will use technology developed to build Japan's extensive Shinkansen network-on which trains run at more than 300 kilometers an hour-and will be a welcome update to India's vast but often inefficient and overburdened railway network, which acts as a break on the country's economic growth.

Both Modi and Abe are right-wing nationalists and economic reformers who have forged an unusually close relationship since the Indian leader came to power previous year, partly to counter China's growing influence.

Responding to Modi, Abe said, "We have taken relationship to new level and buds have turned into blossoms".

The "difficult issues" in negotiations included Japan's insistence to add a clause in the agreement providing for termination of the cooperation in the event of a nuclear test by India. It also said that maintenance of the peace and tranquility in the Indo-Pacific waters was a shared goal of the two countries. The agreement paves way for Japan to participate in India's civil nuclear sector by making components for India's nuclear reactors.

"We hope that countries outside the region will respect efforts being made by the countries in the region to maintain security and stability of the SCS rather than the other way around", he said.

Modi's government has set up an office to promote inward investment from Japan and the two leaders last year vowed to double direct investment within five years.