There are many things that can unite Pakistan with Bangladesh and India. We have shared history, more or less common language, common heritage, literature, art, and culture. These commonalities can be enhanced through track II diplomacy, which in turn can be expanded and taken to another level through skilled diplomacy of leaders. 

With China not budging from its position on India's NSG bid, Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar has called for a "sensible and pragmatic" conversation between the two sides on how "not accommodating" each others aspiration was detrimental to the overall relationship. The Foreign Secretary also observed India should use its soft power and do more in improving its image in China as people there do not have a very fair idea about the country.

Barely a month after power forward Palpreet Singh Brar was picked up for the NBA Developmental League in the players draft for the Long Island Nets, the premier basketball league in the world has decided to launch an elite academy in India. [...] The 24 candidates will be closely working with coaches from coaches from the NBA, with an Indian coach standing alongside him.

The Government has taken a new initiative to create a Film Promotion Fund to promote Indian cinema in the International Film Festivals. This initiative would help independent filmmakers to promote their work across the globe. The Government efforts to project India as a soft power and filming destination has been a win-win situation so far, in terms of attracting global stakeholders from various quarters of film industry to India as well as Indian films, expertise and talent being accepted globally at international festivals.

In times of terror, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar is an icon of world peace. The spiritual leader speaks to S Gurumurthy about his mediation in Colombia to bring the armed rebels to the negotiation table and how he applied the Gandhian principle of non-violence, and ancient Indian values of yoga and meditation to rid the world of violence and mould it into One Family.

External Affairs Ministry has emerged as one of the top central ministries to effectively use the social media with its Twitter handle @MEAIndia crossing one million followers. "Marking a #digitaldiplomacy milestone with 1,000,000+ followers! Hope to continue to serve & inform in the best traditions of the MEA," External Affairs Ministry Spokesperson Vikas Swarup, who runs the handle, tweeted.

The number of international students at U.S. colleges and universities topped 1 million for the first time, paced by a surge of graduate students in sciences, engineering and math from India. China still sends the most students — 328,500 or nearly a third — but enrollments from India climbed 25 percent to almost 166,000 in 2015–2016.

The government needs to be more open, creative and clear in its communications with the wider world, instead of the conservative, secretive and dull methods that are currently the norm. [...] It’s needs a 21st century restatement of mission and objectives, and expansion of coverage to reach more audiences. It also needs a complete technical and content re-gig.