Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, who will arrive in Delhi on Wednesday night, has much in common with Narendra Modi, India’s prime minister, according to aides and diplomats from the leaders’ two countries.
The two men, both in their early sixties, have met twice – at the July Brics summit in Brazil and at the G20 in Australia last month, where Putin received a chilly reception from western nations angered by Moscow’s intervention in Ukraine.
His welcome in a smoggy but unseasonably temperate Delhi for his first summit with Modi will be much warmer. Russia and India have long had a close relationship, even if the two Asian powers have grown distant in recent decades.
Officials hope the leaders of each power, one a former spy, the other a former organiser for a hardline rightwing organisation, will be able to develop a close personal bond that will bring the two states back together.