The Sri Lankan delegation including Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa is scheduled to visit India again next month, about a month later his previous visit, The Hindu reports.
It is to attend the ‘Vibrant Gujarat’ Global Summit to be held in India from January 10 to 12.
According to ‘The Hindu’ quoting official sources, Minister Basil Rajapaksa is likely to hold talks with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi during this second visit to India.
The minister’s second visit to India comes a day after Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi completes his two-day visit to Sri Lanka.
The report states that Colombo has strong ties with both New Delhi and Beijing at a time when Sri Lanka is facing one of the worst economic downturns in its history.
Basil Rajapaksa was previously in New Delhi from November 30 to December 2.
Although the Minister was scheduled to meet Modi, the meeting was not held due to schedule issues, The Hindu reported.
However, he held several rounds of talks with the Foreign minister S. Jayashankar and Finance Minister Nirmala Seetharaman.
They reached a “four pillars” bilateral agreement, as part of which India agreed to extend emergency loans for food, pharmaceutical, and fuel imports, and money exchange to help Sri Lanka overcome the dollar crisis.
