BIMSTEC – The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Co-operation.

The seven countries in the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) adopted a charter and connectivity roadmap and entrusted India to be at the helm of its security pillar.

“With the charter, Bimstec now has an international personality, it has an emblem, it has a flag, it has formally listed purpose and principles that it is going to adhere to and an architecture.

So that represents a fairly significant evolution of this grouping process which was happening since 2004, but gained traction after 2014,” said additional secretary Bimstec, Rudrendra Tandon.

It constitutes seven Member States: five deriving from South Asia, including Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and two from Southeast Asia, including Myanmar and Thailand.

source: newindianexpress.com (edited)