South Asian countries have been pushed many times by external powers to set aside their political grudges and strive for peace and prosperity in the region. [...] But rarely have external powers been motivated to try initiating people-to-people contact as an alternative path to regional unity and connectivity. People-to-people contact or “public diplomacy” remains the unfulfilled agenda of SAARC.

"Education and cultural diplomacy is the only way forward to strengthen relationship between the SAARC countries. We should, therefore, like to have focused university to university linkages between our countries for mutual capacity building in education, research technology and innovation," Irani said.

"Today I ask our space community to make plans for developing a Saarc satellite, a satellite that provides a full range of applications and services to all our neighbours. There is a lot of poverty in the Saarc nations and we need scientific solutions for this," The Indian Express quotes the PM as saying.

The South Asian University (SAU), which is a first of its kind joint venture for the eight member countries of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), began its first academic session on August 26 this year, with an initial batch of 50 students.

Since bilateral issues cannot officially be tackled in the multilateral forum of SAARC, this comment reflected the common feeling among SAARC member States that the Indo-Pak relations overshadow SAARC meetings. The incapacity of its member States to discuss political issues restrains SAARC’s credibility as a regional organization...

Covering at least 1.5 billion people across India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Maldives and Afghanistan, SAARC is one of the largest regional organizations in the world. But its achievements so far have been so minimal that even its constituents have become lackadaisical in their attitudes toward it.

Thirty-two artists from eight SAARC countries and Myanmar showcased the soft power of art at a day-long exhibition titled "Puducherry Blues" here Saturday. The artists had met in a camp at the Dune Eco beach resort in Puducherry for a South Asian artists' camp in early March.