New Delhi: Former external affairs minister and the Congress’s foreign policy head Salman Khurshid announced today, November 10, that a thousand delegates from 70 countries will be participating in the party’s Bharat Summit, a gathering of progressive politics, political parties, leaders, and ideas; presenting and deliberating a blueprint for a different global order. “There will be countries across the globe but not neighbouring countries,” said Khurshid. “Approvals for all delegates coming from the event have to come through the MEA,” he added.Khurshid acknowledged the contribution of Shashi Tharoor, who helped steer the organisers through the “thicket of the MEA.”Salman Khurshid at the Congress press conference on November 10. Photo: Antara Baruah.“This event is happening at a very interesting time. There have been landmark electoral outcomes from Brazil, Hungary, Serbia, and the mid-term elections of the USA. What are we doing – in the Global South and North – in terms of reinventing, reinvigorating, and reviving that contact,” he asked. “We treat ourselves as intrinsic to the progressive movements of the world.”The senior Congress leader noted the emergence of a ‘new world order’ and the role that Congress party could play in sculpting it. “The intention, the hope, and the expectation is the vision of Rahul Gandhi for India and the world of tomorrow – the emergence of the new global order – and how that is to be handled by the country. Both today, when we are in the opposition, and tomorrow, in 2029, when we will have our top leaders in positions of constitutional power.” Also present at the press conference at the Congress office on 24 Akbar Road were Telangana’s IT minister D. Sridhar Babu, Telangana Congress Committee president Mahesh Goud, and permanent member of the Congress Working Committee, Gurdeep Sappal.The summit will be held in Hyderabad from November 12-14, and will comprise 12 international sessions and eight Telangana-centric sessions, which will be held at a different venue. This year marks the second time the summit is taking place. Other than Khurshid, its other architect is Sam Pitroda, chair of the Indian Overseas Congress.“The world is coming to Hyderabad. This sort of gathering in Hyderabad for the second consecutive year will garner the ideas that will be helpful for our state’s growth,” said D. Sridhar Babu.Sappal spoke about the last decade and a half, when rightwing ideologies took root in countries across the globe.“A hate-filled world took shape. Social media technologies support it – for each problem, an enemy was created. Now, people are realising that they have not benefitted from this form of governance. How do we return politics to the people?” he said. Around 70 think-tanks are also attending the summit, which the leaders said was a space for an exchange of ideas and “practical solutions” that will ultimately serve as a bulwark against the politics of hate. Sappal also officially announced Our World, a think-tank incubated at the Bharat Summit that will comprise progressive thinkers and policy-makers from across the globe. Returning to the intention behind the three-day long conclave, Khurshid referenced the foreign policies of past Congress prime ministers that inform the party’s current view.“Our target is of course 2029. Within those parameters, we want to be able to align fully with the thinking that has been flagged. This [the summit] is a sharing of some of the best practices, the sharing of aspirations,” he said. “I am conscious of the fact that the world has changed. The forces that we once relied on have dissipated. But the principles and ideologies that we have imbibed remain.”Among other progressive parties from across the world, a delegation from the Brazil’s Workers’ Party, the organisation of trade unionist-turned-four-time president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, is due to attend.Meanwhile, Khurshid also explained certain core tenets of the party’s foreign policy. The Congress is against “transactional foreign policy” and for an “ideological foreign policy.” The party agrees with an “englighented-self interest foreign policy” and not one based purely on self-interest. “So, non-alignment is another format, in another perspective, is something that we would certainly want to pursue. But one needs to work on it, and that’s what we hope that these summits can do,” he said.