Under the Young Professionals Programme, BPF partnered with the LSE South Asia society to part sponsor the first ever LSE South Asia Development Conference. This conference was conceptualized by the LSE SU South Asia Society in collaboration with the LSE South Asia Centre. It is a unique initiative which has been pioneered to serve as a forum to identify, discuss and influence the development discourse in the region. The conference provided a platform for some of the prominent voices on South Asia and promised to drive forward the developmental agenda in South Asia. The Commonwealth Youth Development Index Report for South Asia was also launched at this conference.

The conference included the following impressive speakers:

• Kailash Satyarthi (Nobel Laureate)
• Rafiullah Kakar (Commonwealth Secretariat)
• Dr Mukulika Banerjee (Director, LSE South Asian Society)
• E. Mr Dinesh Patnaik (Indian Deputy High Commissioner to the UK)
• Anupam Kher (Indian Actor)
• Beena Sarwar (Pakistani Journalist, Minority Rights Activist and Writer and Visiting Assistant Professor Brown University)
• Sunil Babu Pant (Nepalese Politician and LGBT Activist)
• Garimella Subramaniam (Senior Assistant Editor, the Hindu)
• Iqbal Latif (Writer and Entrepreneur)
• Mrs Hina Rabbani Khar (ex-Foreign Minister of Pakistan)
• E. Durga Bahadur Subedi (Ambassador of Nepal to UK)