This a limit of China's projection of soft power, and maybe this is 'Chinese characteristics'. But in my view, the experiences of others show that you project your soft power not by the government, but mainly by civil society organisations.

With the opening up of the country and the entry of the icons of global trademarks, Beijing started to realise the importance of so-called “soft power”. While the Americans have a lot of problems in many parts of the world, their way of life and their culture — particularly their popular culture — are attractive to hundreds of millions of people around the globe.

So far, Beijing's soft power strategy has focused on ramping up the Chinese media overseas, with steps like state news agency Xinhua taking out advertisements at New York's Times Square. The spread of Confucius Institutes across Asia and the world is another high-profile effort.

China is increasingly making its presence felt internationally. Till now, over 350 Confucius Institutes and 500 Confucius Classrooms have been founded in 105 countries and regions. Aiming to promote Chinese language and culture, the global presence of Confucius Institutes is viewed as a barometer of China's "soft power".

If the Confucius Institute's activities here are a benign example of China's soft power, some strategic analysts are more pessimistic about its effects more broadly in South-East Asia and beyond. The US Council on Foreign Relations has pointed out that many authoritarian and developing nations are looking to China as a model for a non-democratic path to economic growth.

China is expanding its presence on U.S. campuses, seeking to promote its culture and history and meet a growing global demand to learn its language.

Advocating a more pragmatic approach, he wanted India to maintain cordial relations with the countries that would invest in India and help the country meet challenges such as food security, which was assuming a very grave magnitude.

At the end of its four-day annual policy meeting, China’s ruling Communist Party approved a programme to make its ideology more popular at home and boost China’s soft power abroad.