Rajnath Singh Represents India at the 25th SCO Council of Heads of Government Meeting in Dushanbe

19 October 2026National

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh led India's delegation to the 25th Meeting of the Council of Heads of Government (CHG) of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, held at Dushanbe, Tajikistan, on 19-20 October 2026. The CHG is the SCO's second-highest body and handles economic cooperation and the organisation's budget. Discussions covered trade, investment, connectivity, innovation and cultural and humanitarian exchanges, with India pressing startups, digital public infrastructure and people-to-people ties. India had been represented by External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar at the previous CHG in Moscow on 18 November 2025, and chaired the SCO in 2023, hosting that year's summit in virtual format.

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The SCO was founded in 2001 at Shanghai by China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, and its Charter was signed in 2002 | The SCO has ten members: India and Pakistan joined in 2017, Iran in 2023 and Belarus in 2024 | The SCO Secretariat is at Beijing and its Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure (RATS) is at Tashkent; the official languages are Chinese and Russian

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