Posts in the cabinet are highly coveted and tend to be held by party loyalists. Rarely does a bureaucrat pull it off. But Subrahmanyam Jaishankar’s profile is in a class by itself.
When a 64-year-old retired bureaucrat made entry into PM Narendra Modi’s cabinet, it left everyone stunned. On May 30, 2019, he took oath as the External Affairs Minister of India and led off to establish India as a global power around the globe.
He walked into the Ministry of External Affairs when international relations had been turned upside down by US President Donald Trump and China’s Xi Jinping. People who go around with how PM Modi works, understood his move. Jaishankar’s diplomatic wisdom was worth betting on!
The right Man for India’s External Affairs Ministry
Subrahmanyam Jaishankar is a high-profile, quick-witted diplomat with an excellent understanding of the complexities at hand. His ingrained patience for handling tough negotiations and straightforwardness speak volumes. A diplomat like him is one in a million.
He is the second Foreign Secretary in Indian history to become the Minister of External Affairs, after Natwar Singh. But what made Modi choose a career diplomat over a politician? To understand this better, let’s take a tour of his past achievements.
1977 |
Indian Foreign Service Officer |
1979 to 1981 |
Third Secretary and Second Secretary in the Indian mission to the Soviet Union in Moscow |
1985 |
First Secretary at the Indian Embassy in Washington, D.C. |
1988 to 1990 |
Served in Sri Lanka as First Secretary and Political Advisor to the Indian Peacekeeping Force (IPKF) |
1990 to 1993 |
Counsellor at the Indian mission in Budapest |
1991 |
Director (East Europe) in the Ministry of External Affairs |
1996 to 2000 |
Deputy Chief of Mission at the Indian Embassy in Tokyo |
2000 |
India’s Ambassador to the Czech Republic |
2004 to 2007 |
Joint Secretary (Americas) at the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi |
2007 to 2009 |
India’s High Commissioner to Singapore |
2009 to 2013 |
Became India’s longest-serving ambassador to China with a four-and-a-half-year term |
2013 |
India’s Ambassador to the United States in September 2013 |
2015 |
Foreign Secretary of India |
Jaishankar entered the world of diplomacy in 1977 as an Indian Foreign Service Officer and took the plunge to represent India’s interests and foster friendly relations with countries around the globe. 1977 was the year when Indira Gandhi misjudged the mood of the nation, called off the emergency, and ordered new elections. At that time, rebuilding the credibility of India seemed like an arduous task, but he left no stone unturned to portray a positive image of India in global affairs.
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