Saree diplomacy features Sushma Swaraj's Bangladesh visit

For a second day, saree played a role in Indo-Bangladesh diplomacy when External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj was presented with two Jamdani sarees by former premier Khaleda Zia, a day after the visiting Indian leader exchanged sarees with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. "Madam Zia brought with her two Jamdani sarees as she called on the Indian external affairs minister – one was for Sushma Swaraj and another for her daughter," Zia's press secretary Maruf Kamal Sohel told PTI.

Zia, the chairperson of the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party, presented the sarees to Swaraj when she met her at her hotel here today. Yesterday, Swaraj presented a cream-coloured saree to Hasina who in return gifted her famous Bangladeshi Jamdani saree. Swaraj held a nearly 30-minute meeting with Zia who was accompanied by several of her party leaders. The meeting came in the backdrop of the new Indian government's efforts to reach out to all sections of Bangladeshi society during Swaraj's first standalone overseas tour here. This comes after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's shawl diplomacy.

After his swearing-in ceremony last month for which he had invited Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif along with other SAARC leaders, Modi had gifted a shawl to Sharif for his mother. In a reciprocal gesture, Sharif gifted a saree for Modi's mother.