
Iran, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, all in one room, all agreeing on one statement. India made it happen.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi formally opened the BRICS Summit 2026 on Saturday, calling on member nations to move beyond consensus-building and start delivering tangible results on the world stage. Marking the bloc’s 20th anniversary, Modi described the milestone as a “coming of age” moment — one that calls for the same maturity and sense of responsibility a person takes on turning twenty.
From Consensus To Outcomes
PM Modi thanked member nations for backing India’s chairship, noting that the year’s approach had centred on being people-first and human-centric, with resilience, innovation, cooperation and sustainability as guiding priorities. He pointed to the scale of outreach under India’s presidency — over 350 meetings held across nearly 30 cities — as evidence of an effort to connect BRICS more directly with ordinary citizens rather than keep it confined to summit rooms.
He argued that BRICS has built a distinct identity over two decades by respecting differing views among members and moving forward through consensus rather than confrontation, and said the moment has now come to convert that internal unity into concrete outcomes globally.
A New Institutional Mechanism, And A Push For Reform
Modi proposed setting up a BRICS continuity and implementation mechanism to prevent the bloc’s annually rotating presidency from disrupting institutional momentum, suggesting the ‘Troika‘ arrangement — outgoing, current and incoming chairs working together — could track follow-through on initiatives. He also floated a secure digital repository to log the nodal point, timeline and implementation status of every decision taken.
Beyond BRICS’s internal workings, Modi pushed for broader reform of global governance, describing the current structure as pyramid-shaped — power concentrated at the top, while nations affected by global decisions have little say in shaping them.
The Joint Statement Nearly Didn’t Happen
In a significant diplomatic development, BRICS members reached consensus on a joint statement to be issued during the summit, following negotiations that stretched until 4 am on Saturday. India led the effort to bridge sharply divergent positions among members — a task made harder by the presence of Iran, Saudi Arabia and the UAE in the same room, all holding competing stances on ongoing conflicts and tensions in West Asia. That the differences didn’t derail the process is being read as a marker of India’s diplomatic management during its chairship year.
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