However utopian it may seem, a South Asian confederation may actually work. The fate of the people of South Asia cannot be left to nation-states alone. There is a collective regional life beyond the narrow confines of SAARC.
The postponement of the SAARC Summit in November caused a fair amount of breastbeating, with partisans taking one side or the other on India's action. But one striking thing about the postponement is that, in the end, no one, except perhaps the denizens of the SAARC Secretariat in Kathmandu, seemed particularly disappointed.
No one is talking about burying SAARC even though it is a largely unloved organisation. Even its demise, should that happen, will not be particularly mourned. When the Association was formally launched in 1985, there were sceptics, but there was a real hope that the conclave would amount to something, that it would make a difference to the affairs of South Asia, and that in some ineffable way, it reflected the desire of the peoples of the region to come together.
Fourteen years later, however, the sceptics seem to have been proven right. The governments of the region have done little to invigorate the Association and to point it in the direction of anything that would capture the imagination of the peoples of South Asia. The best that one can say about SAARC is that a certain amount of "social capital" has been generated: expert and technical committee meetings, NGO meetings under the aegis of SAARC, and the summits have brought South Asians in various fields and at various levels into contact with each other at regular intervals, leading to a certain amount of camaraderie and trust.