India, March 6 -- China on Thursday hiked its defence budget by a little over 10 per cent to $275 billion, about $25 billion more than last year, as it ramped the modernisation of armed forces to catch up with the US military.

Roughly 1.9 trillion yuan (about $275 billion) will be allocated to national defence, Chinese Premier Li Qiang announced in his work report presented to the National People's Congress (NPC) on Thursday.

The report said China's defence spending remains comparatively modest across key relative indicators, including its share of GDP, per capita defence expenditure, and defence expenditure per military personnel.

Last year, China announced a 7.2 per cent increase for its national defence budget to $249 billion for 20...