With SAARC video-call, India leads regional response to coronavirus pandemic

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi shows India’s leadership in the South Asian

With SAARC video-call, India leads regional response to coronavirus pandemic While the epidemic of the new strain of the coronavirus or COVID-19 is causing concern and cessation of economic activity in South Asian countries. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi shows India’s leadership in the South Asian region by inviting all the 8 states of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) members to convene a video conference to foster regional cooperation against the spread of COVID-19 that consists of the country's leaders from Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Bhutan Prime Minister Lotay Tshering, the Maldives President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, Nepal Prime Minister Oli, Sri Lanka President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Pakistan's Health Minister Zafar Mirza participate in a video conference on behalf of Prime Minister Imran Khan. This video call played a great role in triggering SAARC, which has been sluggish since 2016. Following the 2016 Uri terror attacks that year by a Pakistan-based group, India had refused to participate in the SAARC summit, which was to be held in Islamabad. The summit was finally called off as three other nations (Bhutan, Nepal, Afghanistan) also withdrew from the summit. Then, the SAARC Summit never happened again until this time. Modi’s initiative now is a positive move toward smooth South Asian integration. Such a grouping is a helpful way for regional nations to show solidarity with countries that face disaster or crisis. However, India also has the intention to maintain India’s leadership role as the world’s largest democracy amid China’s ambitions which expands its influence in South Asian countries, especially through Pakistan. India proposed and committed an initial pledged of $10 million toward a COVID-19 emergency fund and it also announced that it would be putting together a SAARC states team of specialists and medicals called Rapid Response Team for cope with this rapid outbreak. Furthermore, India will create an intensive medical training system and also share the Integrated Disease Surveillance Portal system technology which is used to trace the spread of infected people to SAARC member countries. For most of the SAARC heads of state, the initiative was welcomed rapidly and with enthusiasm. An additional $5 million has been added to the fund from Sir Lanka, $1.5 million from Bangladesh, $1 million from Nepal, $1 million from Afghanistan, $200 thousand from the Maldives, and $100 thousand from Bhutan. Pakistan did not seem to agree to contribute towards the COVID-19 fund and was in a quandary on how to respond to India's initiative in organizing this meeting. The SAARC video call has proved an unprecedented and timely initiative to collectively rein in the threat of COVID-19 can be seen as a thoughtful drive to respond to China’s growing influence in the region by reasserting India’s leadership in the South Asian region. In this case, Thailand may play a leading role at the regional level by driving the cooperation between ASEAN member countries to come up with an efficient coordinated response and solidarity to contain the spread of COVID-19 as well.