GUWAHATI: India has invited Pakistan’s National Heritage and Culture Minister Aurangzeb Khan Khichi to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Civilisational Dialogue Forum in New Delhi on November 20 and 21, according to reports.
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The invitation marks the first time India has invited a senior Pakistani minister since military hostilities between the two countries following Operation Sindoor in May 2025.
The last visit by a senior Pakistani minister to India was in May 2023, when then Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto travelled to Goa to attend a meeting of the SCO Council of Foreign Ministers.
The Civilisational Dialogue Forum is being organised jointly by India’s ministries of culture and external affairs. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had proposed the dialogue at the SCO leaders’ summit in Tianjin last year.
In October 2024, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar visited Pakistan to attend the SCO Council of Heads of Government meeting. He became the first Indian foreign minister to visit Pakistan in nine years.
Operation Sindoor was launched on May 7, 2025, following the Pahalgam terror attack that killed 26 people. During the military operation, Indian forces struck nine terror camps in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). The confrontation lasted four days before a ceasefire was announced on the evening of May 10.
Despite tensions between India and Pakistan, the SCO has continued to provide a platform for engagement between the two countries, even as substantive bilateral discussions have remained limited for more than a decade.
The invitation comes weeks after India sent its SCO national coordinator, Alok Dimri, to Pakistan for a high-level meeting to finalise the grouping’s agenda and meetings ahead of the next summit.
Pakistan currently holds the SCO presidency and is scheduled to host the organisation’s heads of state summit next year.
