Peking University, one of the top institutions in the People's Republic of China, will celebrate the 100th anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore's visit to the institution with a symposium on him and his global vision in May this year.

Zha Liyou, the Chinese consul general in Calcutta, announced the decision of the central university in his country, during a media interaction here.

"The preparations for the programme at Peking University, which Tagore visited 100 years ago, are underway... It will be held sometime in May this year," said Liyou.

Tagore had reached the shores of China following an invitation to deliver a series of talks for the first time on April 12, 1924, along with eminent teachers of Visva-Bharati and spent several months in the country. The Nobel laureate visited the country again in 1928.

According to Liyou, the university is inviting some Indian scholars to participate in the symposium and his office is co-ordinating the participation of scholars and Tagore researchers for the event.

A source in Visva-Bharati said that the consulate has already communicated with the varsity authorities asking for names of the scholars to take part in the centenary celebrations of Rabindranath Tagore's first visit to China.

"Usually, scholars from Chinese departments are sent to such programmes in China. This time we have been requested to send two or three scholars to Peking University. We are yet to finalise the names. We need to get permission from the Union external affairs ministry before sending someone there," said a senior Visva-Bharati official.

Not just Peking University, some other academic institutes are also planning to organise events to commemorate Tagore's first visit to China, during which he went to Beijing, Hangzhou, Nanjing, Jinan, among other places. As China was going through political upheaval and social unrest then, the trip had its due share of controversies as his views on romance and spiritualism drew criticism.

The hostilities, however, did not prevent Tagore from planning the Cheena Bhavana at Visva-Bharati, which was built by Professor Tan Yun-Shan under Tagore's patronage, as a centre of Sino-Indian cultural studies.

Liyou said the consulate in Calcutta was exploring the possibility of commemorative events at Santiniketan.

A source at the Visva-Bharati centre said the department of Chinese studies was in talks with the consulate to celebrate the centenary of Tagore's visit to China in the first week of April by inviting scholars from China.