The Chao Track India
The Chao Track is an India-Pakistan Track II dialogue process conceptualized in 2008 after the horrific 9/11 Mumbai attacks. From 2008 to December 2017, the process ran under the aegis of the Chaophraya Dialogue. The process was resumed in August 2018, expanding its scope to regional stability in South Asia, under The Chao Track banners.
The project is currently conducted by CSDR. We curate platforms for informed members of the strategic communities in India and Pakistan to discuss the future of bilateral relations. Over the past decade, senior former officials (Including Ambassadors, Foreign Secretaries, Intelligence Chiefs and top-ranking members of the Armed Forces), academics, journalists and political leaders have participated in the Chao Track’s various programmatic activities. The Pakistan chapter of the project is managed by the Jinnah Institute.
Over the past few years, India-Pakistan relations have taken a down turn across sectors. Bilateral trade and cooperation on water sharing, ecological conservation, etc. has come to a halt. We understand the importance of national priorities, and the Chao Track is aimed at managing bilateral conflict by instituting off-ramps that can play an important role during escalation of tensions. The Chao Track distinguishes itself from other similar initiatives by being locally owned and locally directed with roots and traction in New Delhi and Islamabad. The project has managed to bring together interlocutors with myriad political and strategic opinions. Three separate dialogue processes are currently run under The Chao Track; and the process has so far led to twenty-six rounds of dialogue, now entering its eleventh year.