‘Mera Yuva Bharat’ (MY Bharat), a flagship youth engagement initiative of the Government of India’s Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports collaborates with the Sufi Islamic Board (SIB), a Mumbai-based religious non-governmental organization.

The collaboration, formally established in 2025, represents a significant convergence of interests, serving as a compelling case study in contemporary state-civil society relations in India, particularly concerning the engagement of minority communities. this partnership is fundamentally symbiotic. For the Indian government, it provides a credible and cooperative Muslim voice that publicly endorses its nationalist vision of a ‘Viksit Bharat @ 2047’ (Developed India by 2047). The SIB, with its pronounced “Nation First” ideology and its aggressive public stance against radical Islamist organizations like the Popular Front of India (PFI), aligns perfectly with the state’s security and national integration objectives. This alliance allows the government to demonstrate inclusive outreach to the Muslim community, thereby countering narratives of exclusion, while simultaneously leveraging the SIB’s grassroots network for its social campaigns. For the Sufi Islamic Board, the partnership confers unprecedented legitimacy, a national platform, and access to state-facilitated networks, elevating its public profile and positioning it as a key interlocutor for the state within the diverse Indian Muslim community. The cornerstone of their joint activity is the ‘Nasha Mukt Yuva for Viksit Bharat’ (Drug-Free Youth for a Developed India) campaign. It has provided a safe and productive “neutral ground” for the partnership to flourish publicly, manifesting in a series of high-profile, pan-India events. These include the multi-faith ‘Youth Spiritual Summit’ in Varanasi, which culminated in the ‘Kashi Sankalp’ (Kashi Declaration), and a targeted de-addiction seminar for inmates at Sabarmati Jail in Ahmedabad.

The Formal Onboarding: Stated Goals and Mutual Objectives

The Sufi Islamic Board was officially selected as a partner organization for the ‘MY Bharat’ initiative in September 2025. The publicly stated goal of this collaboration is to contribute to the overarching national vision of achieving a ‘Vikasit Bharat by 2047’. The announcement was met with public expressions of gratitude from the SIB’s leadership. National President Mansoor Khan explicitly thanked the Union Minister of Youth Affairs and Sports, Mansukh Mandaviya, for the government’s trust and for enabling the SIB to “onboard the vision to make Viksit Bharat”.

Khan’s statements frame the partnership as a profound responsibility, asserting that “Nation First is our priority” and that the MY Bharat portal is “where the vision is being shaped”. This rhetoric underscores the SIB’s willing acceptance of its role within the government’s framework. The collaboration is thus publicly presented not as a transactional arrangement but as a shared mission in nation-building, with the SIB positioning itself as one of India’s “most trusted” and “most prolific” non-governmental organizations committed to supporting the national cause.