Sino-Indian trade volumes to exceed $65 billion in 2016

India has held trade relations with China for centuries, although modern trade between the two countries began in the 1950's.

The Silk Road served as the main trade network for the two countries initially.

After several skirmishes between the 1960's and 1980's accompanied by military conflicts, trade relations between the two countries were restored in the late 1980's.

In 2012, China's Premier, Wen Jiabo, stated that he looked to strengthen and grow trade relations between the two countries.

Pitching it to be the most "important bilateral partnership of the century", the Premier and Manmohan Singh, the then Prime Minister of India, set a goal to raise bilateral trade to $100 billion by 2015.

In 2012, bilateral trade was worth $73.9 billion.

Late last year, China became India's biggest trading partner, while India ranked as China's seventh biggest exporter.

The economic cooperation between the two countries has charted tremendous growth, from just about $2 billion in 2000 to $70 billion last year.

The main products that India imported from China were chemicals, agri products, metals, electronics, sanitary wares, tiles and furniture.

Bilateral trade between India and China are estimated to cross $65 billion for this year, reports said, citing a Chinese diplomat.

The bilateral trade volume between the two countries stood at $52.14 billion from January to September, and is estimated to exceed $65 billion by December 2016.

The key sectors that China had focused in India during 2016 were electronics, IT, infrastructure and finance.