India to Chair BRICS in 2026 as Bloc Marks 17 Years of Summits

India will take over the BRICS chair in 2026 and host the group's 18th summit, its third time leading the bloc. The grouping has changed considerably since it first met seventeen years ago — and so has India.

From a research note to a summit

BRICS did not begin as a diplomatic project. In 2001, Goldman Sachs economist Jim O'Neill grouped Brazil, Russia, India and China under the acronym "BRIC", predicting that these four economies would drive global growth for decades. There was no summit and no secretariat at the time — only a research note.

The idea acquired institutional shape in 2009, when Russia hosted the first BRIC summit. India was among the participants. The timing was significant: the 2008 financial crisis had shaken confidence in the Western-led economic order, and emerging economies argued that institutions built after the Second World War no longer reflected the shape of the world. BRICS became a platform for that argument.

South Africa joined later, adding the "S" to the acronym.

A grouping, not an alliance

BRICS is not an alliance in the conventional sense. Its members differ on political questions, with some maintaining close ties to the West and others taking a different line. India's own position illustrates the spread: it has close defence ties with Moscow, a difficult relationship with Beijing, and warming ties with Washington and Brussels, all maintained simultaneously.

For India, the grouping has functioned less as a side to be chosen than as a set of instruments to be used selectively.

Building institutions

The 2014 summit in Fortaleza, Brazil, marked a shift from declarations to institutions. Leaders signed off on the New Development Bank and a Contingent Reserve Arrangement, creating alternatives to the IMF and World Bank rather than only criticising them from outside. The bank is headquartered in Shanghai and finances infrastructure and development projects in member states and beyond.

India has hosted the summit twice before, in 2012 and 2016. It held the chair again in 2021 during the pandemic, when it pushed cooperation on digital health, technology and innovation, including the creation of a BRICS Startup Forum.

Expansion changes the arithmetic

The 2023 summit in Johannesburg was a turning point. BRICS agreed to expand, and Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the UAE joined in 2024, followed by Indonesia in 2025. A five-country club became a much larger grouping spanning Asia, Africa and the Middle East, including major oil producers and large new markets.

The expansion offers India a larger platform for Global South priorities and more leverage to press for institutional reform. It also brings more competing agendas, older disputes between members, and more instances where New Delhi may need to mediate to keep meetings on track.

The 2026 agenda

The context for India's chairship includes ongoing conflicts, disrupted trade routes, renewed concerns over energy security, shifting supply chains and competition over artificial intelligence. Developing countries continue to press for greater representation at the UN Security Council, the IMF and the World Bank.

India's theme for its chairship rests on four words: resilience, innovation, cooperation and sustainability. Officials acknowledge that the harder task is ensuring the round produces outcomes beyond a joint statement.

Strategic autonomy, not substitution

BRICS does not replace India's participation in other forums. New Delhi simultaneously engages the Quad, the G20 and its bilateral relationships with the United States, the European Union, Japan and Gulf states — an approach officials describe as strategic autonomy. BRICS places India in the same room as China, Russia, Brazil and South Africa; the Quad links it with the US, Japan and Australia; the G20 bridges developed and developing economies.

In 2001, India was one name on an economist's list of economies expected to matter. In 2026, it will chair the bloc it helped build. New Delhi maintains that its objectives are not ideological, but centred on a larger voice for the Global South and institutions that reflect the present rather than 1945.