BHUBANESWAR: Union Education Minister Pralhad Joshi on Friday reiterated India’s commitment to a people-centric and humanity-first approach to BRICS cooperation.
Chairing the 13th BRICS Education Ministers’ Meeting on its concluding day in the state capital, Joshi expressed confidence that the momentum generated by the deliberations would lead to meaningful actions in preparing the youth for emerging opportunities while remaining firmly rooted in human values.
Referring to India’s BRICS Chairship-2026 theme, ‘Building for Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability’, the minister said learners, teachers, researchers and young people should remain at the centre of policymaking and international cooperation. He stressed the importance of preserving and promoting traditional and indigenous knowledge systems, complementing innovation with heritage.
Joshi also highlighted Odisha’s rich legacy as an ancient centre of learning and reflected on India’s enduring civilisational values of ‘Atithi Devo Bhava’ and ‘Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam.’
He said the 13th BRICS Education Ministers’ Declaration reflects the collective commitment of BRICS nations to strengthen cooperation across the priority areas. The declaration focused on strengthening early childhood care and education (ECCE) and foundational literacy and numeracy (FLN) to promote universal and inclusive access to quality learning; strengthening cooperation in skill development and technical and vocational education and training (TVET); enhancing research, innovation and startup ecosystems for innovation-driven entrepreneurship, encouraging safe, ethical and human-centred use of AI in education and deepen collaboration among higher education institutions, researchers and startup ecosystems.
The declaration also stressed advancing mutual recognition of qualifications (MRQ) for facilitating greater academic mobility and cooperation and strengthening capacity building for academic leadership and institutional development with focus on STEM. The meeting decided to work towards a BRICS University Global Ranking and Evaluation System.
The declaration also acknowledged India’s initiative to undertake an International Skill Gap Study with participation of interested BRICS members on a voluntary basis. It also welcomed India’s initiative on the BRICS Guiding Principles on strengthening academic collaboration on traditional and indigenous knowledge systems and suggested that the BRICS Network University may consider inclusion of traditional and indigenous knowledge systems as an additional International Thematic Group.
Ministers, senior officials and delegates from BRICS member countries, including Brazil, Russia, China, South Africa, Indonesia, Iran, Ethiopia and United Arab Emirates attended the three-day meeting, from August 5 to 7. The Ministry of Education also hosted the 3rd BRICS Senior Officials’ Meeting (SOM) under India’s BRICS chairship 2026, on August 5, in the state capital.