Colombo Financial City has so far been one of the most geopolitically derisive and controversial of all of China’s international development projects.

Formerly called Colombo Port City, the 269 hectare business district that is being built on reclaimed land off the coast of Sri Lanka’s capital has drawn the ire of India since the project commenced for the first time in 2014. The reason for this reaction is simple: the $1.4 billion new city of skyscrapers, hotels, and shopping malls is nearly 100% Chinese foreign direct investment and the original plan (since revised) had 50 hectares of permanent freehold rights going to China.

The possibility of the upstart superpower to the east having its very own outpost just off the shores of Tamil Nadu didn’t resonate well with India. This was in no small part due to the fact that Colombo Financial City was to become a major station along China’s 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, which also includes new Chinese-backed ports in Myanmar, Bangladesh, the Maldives, and Pakistan — essentially surrounding India in what has been dubbed a “string of pearls.” India’s apprehension about the hypothetical strategic nature of Colombo Financial City was in no way assuaged when Chinese military submarines and a warship pulled into port near the project area in 2014.

“So there China would be, a Chinese company would be getting land that is reclaimed from the sea and equal rights to part of it and so on. So that was controversial in India and they felt that there was a risk that China is going to have naval interests and a security presence there and how that would affect India’s own geopolitical position,” explained Deshal de Mel, a senior economist at Hayleys Plc in Colombo.

For the next couple of years, Colombo Financial City would become the frontline of China and India’s geopolitical showdown, with one side always trying to whittle down the influence of the other. But it no longer has to be this way.

Yi Xianliang, China’s ambassador to Sri Lanka, invited India to participate in the Colombo Financial City project last month.

“We welcome any third party to join Sri Lanka and China. We are not opposed to India or any other country. China already has many business relationships with India,” Yi said.

While India remains hesitant about taking hold of the olive branch just yet, joining in on the financial city project wouldn’t necessarily be too far outside of their established ambitions in Sri Lanka. The Asia Times reported that just last month India’s Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced that over the next few years India would be investing upwards of $2 billion in Sri Lanka — and Colombo Financial City is the biggest investment project that Sri Lanka has going.

China has already vouched an additional $8 billion to pump into the financial city project and Sri Lanka expects the FDI total to top $13 billion, in what is the largest infrastructure project in the country’s history. When it is all said and done Colombo Financial City is projected to become a game changing financial center that could rival Singapore to the east and Dubai to the west.

India was never necessarily excluded from this project or any other along China’s Belt and Road initiative, which includes the Maritime Silk Road. In fact, the leading nation of South Asia has been invited to participate on numerous occasions, which would further develop and enhance the diplomatic and financial links between the world’s two largest emerging economies.

After a series of starts and stops, years of geopolitical jockeying, and the threat of a massive law suit, Colombo Financial City is back online — land is being reclaimed and it’s looking as if the new city is actually going to be built. And maybe, just maybe, this time it won’t be a source of contention between two of Asia’s heavyweight economies, who could potentially join forces in what is certainly one of the biggest and most dynamic development projects happening in the world today.