After India and China signed the memorandum of understanding (MoU) between Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), India and HanBan /Confucius Institute Headquarters on August 24, 300 Indian teachers could now get ready for their Mandarin language training days in Beijing.

The Ambassador Dr. Jaishankar and Xu Lin, Director General Hanban, signed the MoU at the India Culture Centre Auditorium in Beijing. But they did not reveal when Indian teachers would come for the training in Peking University and Beijing Foreign Studies University.

Though China is India’s largest trading partner and neighbor across the Himalayas, Chinese language is barely taught in India. This is the first time that India officials ask for cooperating with Hanban, according to Xu.

"Besides training Indian teachers, experts from both sides will make teaching outline and creating teaching materials," said Xu.

CBSE is a Board of Education for public and private schools, under the Union Government of India. And Hanban is committed to developing Chinese language and culture teaching resources and making its services available worldwide.

When asked what the use of learning Chinese for Indian students is, Dr. Jaishankar answered that it’s not only for their careers in the future, but also for learning about China.

He also said, "My son is in middle school. I hope he can learn Chinese when he goes back to India."

Before signing the MoU, Xu spoke highly of India’s ability of cultural communication. She said that China should learn the ability from its neighbor.

For some foreigners, Chinese is hard to learn. Xu said, “In fact, Chinese is not that hard to learn. I know young Indians who can speak Chinese well.” She also admitted that promoting Chinese language and culture in India is not easy, “We need to be patient and confident to spend 20 years there.”