India Forms 60+ Parliamentary Friendship Groups

India===Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla has constituted Parliamentary Friendship Groups with more than 60 countries, marking a significant expansion of India's parliamentary diplomacy. This initiative aims to strengthen dialogue and cooperation between the Indian Parliament and legislatures worldwide through sustained and issue-based interaction. The Friendship Groups comprise Members of Parliament from across party lines, including senior leaders like Ravi Shankar Prasad, P. Chidambaram, Akhilesh Yadav, and Shashi Tharoor, who will lead these groups with specific countries such as Israel, Italy, Australia, and France. The objective is to enable Indian lawmakers to engage directly with their counterparts abroad, exchange legislative experiences, and build long-term trust. These groups are also expected to facilitate discussions on trade, technology, social policy, culture, and shared global challenges, complementing the government's diplomatic engagements and adding depth to people-to-people and lawmaker-to-lawmaker ties. This move builds on previous multi-party outreach efforts by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and signals a renewed emphasis on parliamentary diplomacy to enhance India's global standing.