Post Pandemic Health Diplomacy in South Asia: A Case Study of SAARC’s Post - Covid Regional Reengagement with South Asian Nations

Abstract

This paper examines the role played by South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) in the era that followed the covid-19 pandemic and the influence that it had in bringing post-pandemic resilience within the South Asian region. The objective of this study is to identify how South Asian Nations came together to work hand-in-hand with SAARC for the safety of their citizens and to identify the degree of influence that SAARC‟s policies had in healing a contaminated and unstable post-pandemic Asia. South Asia had long been engulfed in regional animosity followed by the India-Pakistan rivalry. Thus, the particular significance of the study is to elucidate how SAARC stands under the highlight amidst the other regional organizations in executing its reengagement policy which brought the South Asian nations together in strategic dialogue, with the aim of establishing a sustainable and healthy outreach to the mayhem caused by the Covid19 pandemic. The study which analyzes the post-pandemic policies of SAARC follows a qualitative approach based on secondary data sources gathered mainly through documents published by SAARC Secretariat. The findings of the research purports that SAARC has been able to configure a new post-pandemic architecture that has improved regional response rates of the nations and thereby has augmented the quality of life of South Asian people applied. All in all, it could be derived that, in spite of the inefficiencies and undiscerning policies of SAARC, it had been able to maintain a considerable amount of stability and resistance within the South Asian region followed by the Covid19 pandemic.