Why does China portray India as an elephant? Decoding politics of animal analogy

A map of part of the Asian continent, with the Middle East and Northern Africa. gettyimagesbank

In December 2010, on the final day of his three-day India visit, Chinese premier Wen Jiabao offered a metaphorical vision for bilateral ties, suggesting that "the dragon and the elephant should tango."

The analogy — dragon for China, elephant for India — had already circulated in Western academic and media circles as a comparative frame. With Wen's remark, it formally entered China's diplomatic lexicon.

Over the past 15 years, through cycles of border tensions and uneasy resets, China's aspirational animal analogy has remained a peacetime constant: leaders float it, state media amplifies it and the pattern repeats with clockwork regularity.

India, however, has declined to take up the rhetorical offer — on the dance floor or off it.

Some Indian experts say New Delhi's reluctance to embrace Beijing's poetic flourish reflects its own view of China, shaped less by symbolism than by a lived history of military confrontation and accumulated distrust.

But Chinese analysts argue the phrase underscores the two countries as development partners rather than rivals, and signals Beijing's respect for India's civilisational heritage.

Chinese President Xi Jinping last used the metaphor in January in his congratulatory message to Indian President Droupadi Murmu on the country's Republic Day, calling on both sides to realise the vision of "dragon and the elephant dancing together."

In August, Xi also spoke about the framing during his meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Tianjin. The Indian prime minister, as before, did not return the "dance" favor.

On March 7 last year, on the sidelines of the "two sessions," China's annual legislative gathering, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi invoked the phrase again while speaking about China-India ties.

"A cooperative pas de deux of the dragon and the elephant is the only right choice for both sides," Wang said.

Sudheendra Kulkarni, a close aide to former Indian prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and proponent of strong China-India ties, said China's overtures showed that its top leaders "genuinely desire better relations with India."

"They are not simply using some nice-sounding words," he said.

Ashok Kantha, India's ambassador to China from 2014 to 2016, recalled his amusement when the Chinese government formalised the analogy in its official communication.

"When I first heard the term dragon-elephant dance, I remember thinking that the dragon and the elephant would make for very odd dance partners, indeed, a choreographer's nightmare," he said.

He was not surprised that the Indian government decided to ignore the overtures, calling Delhi's stance "deliberate and understandable."

"Diplomatic language is never neutral. When you adopt someone else's framing, you partially legitimise their world view," he added.

Nirupama Rao, former Indian foreign secretary and ambassador to China from 2006 to 2009, said India tended to "avoid adopting metaphors coined by the other side, especially when they implicitly define the relationship."

"Our language has stayed grounded. We speak ... of mutual respect, sensitivity to each other's concerns and managing differences. There is a certain discipline in that. We prefer substance over symbolism," she said.

Two elephants fight each other during the Suwori festival in Boko, India, April 20, 2007. AP-Yonhap

Independent geopolitical analyst Aadil Brar, contended that many Indians "understandably resist" the analogy because they viewed the ties "less through symbolism and more through power, parity and coercion at the border."

"A metaphor that may sound reassuring in Beijing can sound stale, tone deaf or even manipulative in India because it is being deployed after years of military confrontation," he added.

Brar was referring to the 3,000 km (1,864-mile) unresolved border issue that remains the biggest source of tensions between the two neighbours. It triggered the 1962 war and periodic clashes over six decades, including a confrontation in June 2020 that killed at least 20 Indian soldiers and four Chinese troops.

After the incident, both sides deployed thousands of troops with heavy weaponry and remained locked in a stand-off for more than four years. India banned a host of Chinese apps and instituted strict investment screening measures against Chinese companies.

Tensions began to ease in 2024 with a series of border arrangements, leading to the resumption of high-level dialogue, regular flights and people-to-people exchanges.

This month, they held their first bilateral dialogue on the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the Eurasian security grouping that includes Russia, Pakistan, Iran and four Central Asian states.

Apart from the border, China's widening trade surplus against India and Delhi's dependence on Beijing for hi-tech manufacturing continue to pose major concerns.

Rao said China's use of the dragon-elephant phrase "even after periods of serious tension, suggests a certain rigidity."

"It is a preferred signature tune that has not quite caught up with the realities of the relationship," she said.

Gao Jian of Shanghai International Studies University acknowledged that "strategic mistrust" persisted between the two countries, but argued that Beijing believed both sides should act with the "big picture" in mind.

He said China's use of the "dragon-elephant" metaphor should be viewed "within the context of eastern culture."

"In both Indian and Chinese cultures, the elephant symbolises wisdom, power, stability and peace. The use of this metaphor is rooted in respect for the profound heritage and immense scale of Indian civilisation," he said.

Kulkarni echoed the sentiment, and noted that using the elephant as a counterpart to the dragon was appropriate because "both symbolise auspiciousness in our respective cultures."

"We Indians revere the Elephant-God Ganesha as the remover of obstacles."

But Jabin Jacob, director of the centre for Himalayan studies at Delhi's Shiv Nadar University, did not agree that Beijing's characterisation was noble.

"It is intended to convey a sense [of] Chinese grandeur or power whereas the elephant is seldom seen as possessing equivalent power. Rather, it is seen as large but possibly slow and clumsy in comparison to a dragon," he said.

Jacob also highlighted that China chose the elephant, rather than India's national animal, the Bengal tiger, for the metaphor.

"If there is nothing to be read into it, the Chinese would make the switch from elephant to tiger. But they won't because these images convey meanings and it is not the Chinese intention to make India look powerful vis-a-vis China," he said.

For Rao, the issue is not the animals themselves but Beijing assigning India a metaphor without its consent.

"China has chosen its own emblem — the dragon — and, in effect, chosen India's as well. That is where the discomfort lies. It is less about the animal itself and more about who frames the relationship, and how," she added.

India stands out as the only major power for which China employs an official animal analogy. While Chinese state media occasionally invokes a dragon-bear framing for China-Russia ties, it does not feature in formal diplomatic language.

Russian President Vladimir Putin referred to it last year while discussing Russia-India-China ties, crediting the Chinese president for "coining" the dragon-elephant formulation and joked that the media had since added the Russian bear to the mix.

According to Gao Jian, of the Shanghai International Studies University, India is uniquely assigned a metaphor because China is trying to flip a Western-led narrative that seeks to sow division between the two Asian powers.

"For a long time, external observers, particularly in Western media, have been accustomed to viewing the simultaneous rise of China and India through the lens of a zero-sum game."

He added that by advocating for the "dragon and elephant tango" China intended to emphasise that the "two nations are development partners rather than rivals."

The analogy echoes the once-popular 1950s slogan, "Hindi-Chini bhai bhai [Indians and Chinese are brothers]" when India and China signed a landmark agreement on the "five principles of peaceful coexistence" and pledged to stand together against Western imperialism. The solidarity proved short-lived, culminating in the 1962 conflict.

That history, Kantha says, explains an "ingrained reluctance in India to accept a catchy but inaccurate formulation."

In his view, "China does not consider India a peer nation, and is hardly inclined to dance with it" on regional and global issues.

Jacob of the Shiv Nadar University also pointed out that China's portrayal could be having an opposite effect.

"These framings do reinforce the mistrust. The recent 'stabilisation' in bilateral relations, if it can be called that, is tactical," he said.

But Kulkarni wants Indian policymakers and analysts to move beyond "pointless carping and fault-finding" and promote China-India unity to navigate an uncertain geopolitical environment.

"Let's focus on the substance of our relationship. The debate over symbolism will then become meaningless."

While Brar agreed that India's "best response is not semantic outrage but conceptual clarity," he said Delhi should "refuse the symbolism without overreacting to it."

For Kantha, India's "quiet refusal to echo Beijing's vocabulary is itself a form of messaging."

"Let the dragon propose the dance — India need not accept the invitation to be led."

Read the article at SCMP.