Prime Minister Modi conducted 15 formal bilateral meetings over three days during the BRICS Summit hosted in New Delhi in September 2026, plus additional pull-aside conversations with visiting leaders. India, holding the BRICS chair for 2026, used the summit to advance strategic and economic partnerships simultaneously. The meetings covered a broad range of partners, reflecting India's intent to leverage multilateral gatherings for bilateral diplomatic output at scale.

BRICS — originally Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa — expanded in 2024 to include Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, making it BRICS+. India assumed the BRICS chairship for 2026, which means New Delhi sets the agenda, hosts the summit, and shepherds the year's working group outcomes.

When a country chairs a major multilateral forum, the host leader gains a structural diplomatic advantage: every attending head of state or government must come to the host capital. PM Modi's 15 bilaterals in 72 hours illustrate how India converts multilateral hosting duties into bilateral diplomatic capital — a pattern visible at G20 2023 (New Delhi), SCO, and QUAD summits.

For exam purposes, understand three layers: (1) BRICS membership and expansion — who joined in 2024 and when; (2) India's role as 2026 chair — the privileges and responsibilities that entails; (3) the strategic implication — using multilateral platforms to advance bilateral agendas, particularly with countries where standalone summits may be diplomatically difficult (e.g., China or Iran). The BRICS framework also increasingly touches RBI-relevant themes: the push for trade settlement in local currencies, a potential BRICS payment system to reduce dollar dependence, and discussions around a BRICS development bank (New Development Bank, est. 2014, HQ Shanghai).