2010 will be the 40th anniversary of our association that was founded in July 1970. The goals of the association as explained by Prof. van Lohuizen de Leeuw in the foreword to the proceedings South Asian Archaeology 1973 (Brill, Leiden 1974) continue to serve as our guideline:

'... During the meeting at which the Association was founded in 1970, some pertinent statements were drafted with regards to its scope, aims and purposes. The scope of the Association was to comprise "the prehistoric and historic archeology of the Indian subcontinent with its Iranian and Burmese borderlands". The aims and purposes of the Association were stated to consist of a) stimulating contacts between South Asian archaeologists by organizing biennial conferences; b) publishing regular proceedings or, if possible, a journal; and c) exploring means of co-operation between teachers of South Asian archeology both nationally and internationally. The conferences at Cambridge and Amsterdam, and the appearance of their proceedings have already set a pattern for the future. Co-operation between teachers of South Asian archaeology, the third objective, should now be stimulated more vigorously, the more so as such subjects as South Asian archeology are bound to be in the frontline of academic subjects, which will suffer severely from the effects of the present financial and economic crisis. ...' that the Association was meant to include art history could be seen from the following examples of University activities at that time '... An example of such co-operation at the national level can be seen in the annual symposia on problems of South Asian art history organized by the Universities of Cambridge, Oxford and London, and attended by teachers and students from those bodies. On a small scale international co-operation has already started with Professor Härtel's series of lectures at Paris on the excavations of Sonkh, while a slightly more ambitious attempt is now under way as a result of an invitation to Dr. Allchin from the University of Amsterdam. It is hoped that more regular exchange of teaching between Western European universities can be organized in the future along these lines. ...'

(Van Lohuizen de Leeuw & Ubaghs (eds.) 1974:vii, viii)