Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi had an audience with Japanese Emperor Akihito at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo on Tuesday, as part of his five-day trip to Japan to strengthen bilateral ties amid the military rise of China.

The emperor told Modi that the most memorable moment of his trip to India last year with Empress Michiko was when he saw students learning Japanese at Jawaharlal Nehru University holding a debate in the language, according to the Imperial Household Agency.

Modi was quoted as saying by the agency that he hopes to enhance Japanese language education in his country.

The emperor and empress visited India from late November to early December at the invitation of the Indian government to commemorate the 60th anniversary in 2012 of bilateral diplomatic ties.

On Tuesday, Japanese ruling and opposition party lawmakers paid courtesy calls on Modi, who is on his first bilateral trip outside South Asia until Wednesday. Natsuo Yamaguchi, leader of the New Komeito party, the junior ruling coalition partner of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Liberal Democratic Party, agreed with the Indian prime minister to promote exchanges among lawmakers from both countries.

Abe and Modi agreed during a summit on Monday to "seek ways to intensify" a security consultative framework involving the countries' vice foreign and defense ministers, though they stopped short of upgrading it to ministerial level as some had speculated.

Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida on Tuesday hailed the agreement between the two leaders to strengthen ties in the face of an assertive China.

India only holds the so-called two-plus-two vice ministerial dialogue with Japan and has no such dialogue at a ministerial level with any country, according to Kishida.

"As (the two leaders) appreciated this framework and agreed to promote it, I think we can regard it as a major step forward," he said.

Japan holds two-plus-two ministerial dialogues with the United States, Australia, Russia and France, and has also agreed to launch such dialogues with Britain and Indonesia.

During the summit, Abe vowed to extend 3.5 trillion yen in public and private investment and financing to India in five years for infrastructure building and other development projects, after he and Modi agreed to elevate bilateral ties to what they call a "Special Strategic and Global Partnership."

In the face of China's rising territorial ambitions and military buildup, the leaders decided to "upgrade and strengthen" defense ties, and directed their officials to accelerate negotiations for a possible Indian purchase of US-2 amphibious aircraft from Japan.

==Kyodo