New Delhi: The defence minister, Rajnath Singh, will travel to Tajikistan’s capital, Dushanbe, to lead Indian delegation at the 25th meeting of the Council of Heads of Government of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), the Ministry of Defence said on Sunday.
The two-day meeting is scheduled for October 19-20.
According to the ministry, the agenda centres on deepening multilateral cooperation among member states in trade, the economy, investment, connectivity, innovation, and cultural and humanitarian exchanges.
The council is also expected to take stock of ongoing cooperation initiatives and decide on matters concerning the organization's finances and institutional working.
New Delhi said it remains active in the SCO's various mechanisms and has contributed to regional cooperation in areas such as start-ups and innovation, digital public infrastructure, and people-to-people contacts.
The ministry added that the meeting would give India a chance to exchange views with other members on practical, mutually beneficial ways to advance cooperation within the grouping.
Singh will be taking up a slot that has usually gone to the external affairs minister. At the previous council meeting, held in Moscow on November 18, 2025, India was represented by S Jaishankar.
Tajikistan in the chair
The Dushanbe meeting falls within Tajikistan's chairmanship of the SCO in 2026. The agenda is expected to include trade and investment, transport and logistics, industrial cooperation, the digital economy, innovation and financial interaction.
The 25th meeting of SCO economic and trade ministers was held in the city on September 17, and agreed an action plan for 2026-2030 on multilateral trade and economic cooperation, to be submitted to the heads of government.
Senior officials held preparatory sessions online on August 25 and September 11.
The council is one of the SCO's main decision-making bodies. It meets once a year to set priorities for economic and other cooperation and to adopt the organization's annual budget.
Background
Dushanbe last hosted the council on October 12, 2018, when the foreign ministers of India and Pakistan attended alongside the heads of government of other member states, and participants signed 10 resolutions and two further cooperation agreements.
The SCO was founded in 2001 and has grown into a ten-member Eurasian grouping that includes India, China, Russia, Pakistan, Iran and the Central Asian states, with Belarus the latest to join, in 2024.
India became a full member in 2017. The Dushanbe meeting will again put Indian and Pakistani representatives in the same room, which is a regular feature of the grouping's gatherings.
