India has invited Pakistan’s National Heritage and Culture Minister Aurangzeb Khan Khichi to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation’s (SCO) Civilisational Dialogue Forum in New Delhi on November 20 and 21, an Indian media outlet has reported.
Relations between Pakistan and India remain strained following a military stand-off in May 2025.
If Khichi attends, it will mark the first visit by a Pakistani minister to India since May 2023, when then-foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari travelled to Goa for an SCO foreign ministers’ meeting.
India has invited representatives from SCO member states for the forum, which aims to promote cultural exchanges, people-to-people contacts and cooperation around shared heritage, art, literature and traditions.
Despite strained bilateral relations, Pakistan and India have continued to engage through the regional organisation.
In September, an SCO national coordinators’ meeting took place in Islamabad to discuss cooperation and activities under Pakistan’s chairmanship.
Pakistan assumed the SCO Council of Heads of State chairmanship for 2026–27 in September and is scheduled to host the organisation’s leaders’ summit in Islamabad in August 2027.
The country’s chairmanship focuses on regional connectivity, innovation and economic cooperation, the Foreign Office said in a statement.
