India on South Asian Regional Co-operation 1985

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December 8, 1985

India on South Asian Regional Co-operation 1985

Complete Set of 2 nos of postage stamp on the 1^st Summit Meeting of South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation (SAARC), Dhaka, Bangladesh :

Issued by India

Issued on Dec 8, 1985

Type : Stamps, Postal Used

Colour : Multicolour

Denomination : 100 & 300 Paise

About :

South Asian Regional Co-operation, or SARC, as it has widely come to be known, has grown from a concept mooted only a few years ago to a concrete reality today. The seven countries of South Asia, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka embarked upon a regional co-operation following an initiative taken in 1980 by the late President Zia–ur–Rahman of Bangladesh. The South Asian countries have much in common, besides their History, their Geographical and Physical infrastructure, they share a common determination to forge ahead in the world. Their will to progress provides a natural and solid basis for co-operation among them.
To achieve their shared goal, it became essential that all South Asian countries make every effort to improve relationships among and between themselves. It was realised that unless it was done in the true spirit, regional co-operation could only rise to the level of symbolic gestures.
Therefore, it was decided that South Asian Regional Co-operation will enshrine sovereign equality, territorial integrity, political independence, non-interference in internal affairs of other States, mutual benefits which will provide the basic norms governing relations between the South Asian States. It had been accepted that the Seven South Asian countries had already implicitly come to accept the fact that political heterogeneity and independent foreign policies are compatible with close regional co-operation.
The first meeting of the Foreign Ministries of the participating countries was held in New Delhi in August, 1983. The meeting launched the South Asian Regional Co-operation (SARC) and adopted a declaration embodying the principles and objectives of such co-operation.