Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to arrive in New Delhi today

India and Japan are likely to clinch a series of deals, including bullet trains and civil nuclear pact, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi meets his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe in New Delhi today.

“Japan Prime Minister (Shinzo Abe) is coming, he will talk to our Prime Minister for a comprehensive partnership agreement which will address many issues”, railway minister Suresh Prabhu said today at the “Agenda Aaj Tak” event here when asked about the announcement of the bullet train project.

After the talks, Abe will leave for Varanasi, which is Modi’s Parliamentary constituency, where he will attend Ganga Aarti at famous Dasaswamedh Ghat.

At the 2014 summit in Tokyo, the two prime ministers had agreed to advance the relationship to a “special strategic and global partnership”.

Modi and Abe have shown great camaraderie since the former came into power in May a year ago.

China was in September given the right to assess the feasibility of a high-speed train link between Delhi and Chennai, in the south, after getting clearances from India’s security agencies wary of Chinese involvement in infrastructure areas such as telecoms and railways. “This is a major bottleneck for growth”, said Yasutoshi Nishimura, State Minister of Japan’s Cabinet Office, responsible for economic and fiscal policy.

Japan’s Shinkansen high-speed trains, also known as bullet trains, will operate on the proposed 500-kilometer (310.68 miles) railway linking the cities of Mumbai and Ahmedabad in western India.

Abe’s latest trip to India is his third visit as prime minister.

“Make in India” is proceeding in mission mode, not just in India, but also in Japan, he added.

The Indian prime minister said Japan’s decisive role in India’s economic transformation will matter the most in realising its economic dreams.

In October, warships and aircraft from the U.S., India and Japan practiced hunting enemy submarines together in exercises in the Bay of Bengal, signaling the their deepening relationships and rising concerns about China’s growing military and economic influence in the region. The sanctions were lifted in 2001, and bilateral relations have since improved significantly.

A deal with India would be the second successful case of Japan exporting its bullet train technology to a foreign market, following a deal with Taiwan in 2007.

Raja Mohan, strategic analyst at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi, said Mr Abe’s visit would allow the two leaders to “bring to closure some of the big things they have tried”, including the rail deal.

India and Japan have chose to double its private and public investment in India to about Dollars 34 billion over a period of five years.