In the all-male SCO meet, Sushma Swaraj-Nirmala Sitaraman add colour and a bit of gender equality

If you have been on social media lately, there are two pictures that may have caught your attention. The pictures are from the recent foreign and defence ministers' meet hosted by Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in Beijing, which saw multiple Eurasian leaders.

The two pictures we are talking about have defence minister Nirmala Sitaraman in one and external minister Sushma Swaraj in the other, posing with their counterparts.

Both these women, representing India at this international forum, are the only women in the pictures, standing next to their male counterparts from all the other countries.

Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, formed in 2001, includes leaders of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, India and Pakistan. It is 2018 now, and yet, only one country at this meet had its women representing it.

Food for thought, anybody?

Swaraj and Sitaraman, in their respective groups, not only slip in a tad bit of gender equality, but also a dash of colour in these otherwise drab pictures with their striking red and green sarees. That is also not something you would miss.

Social media, of course, has been going gaga over the pictures of Swaraj and Sitaraman at the SCO meets. Railway minister Piyush Goyal also shared the pictures of these two women with the tagline, "Where women are honoured, there divinity blossoms,".

While it is a proud moment for Indians, it would be a better day when such international forums see equal number of women and men, standing shoulder-to-shoulder (well, figuratively, at least!)