Dear Editor,
Comments were made about the creation and appointment of a Foreign Secretary in the office of Ministry of External Affairs. Some ask whether the position is not the same as a Foreign (External) Affairs Minister; others ask what does the job entail. I don’t know the job description when created in July 2019, or the duties of the person appointed earlier this week.
I studied International Relations and Foreign Policy, sub-fields in Political Science in which I earned an accredited doctorate. From my comparative studies, the two titles could be the same, and of course could be held by the same person. In the UK, for example, the Minister of Foreign Affairs is called Foreign Secretary. In India, they are different. In addition to having a Foreign Minister, there is a Foreign Secretary in India. The current Foreign Minister of India, Dr. S Jaishankar, served as Foreign Secretary to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj. Ravi Dev and I were their guests in August 2016 (Delhi) and Jan 2017 (Bangalore) to advise on policymaking towards the Indian Diaspora.
One of our recommendations was the summit of Parliamentarians of Indians in the Diaspora, that was actually held in January 2018 and attended by many from Guyana. As Ravi Dev would attest, when we met Dr Jaishankar twice (I had also met him several times earlier in New York in press conferences), he most impressed us. In our opinion, he was extremely brilliant, knowledgeable, experienced, and articulate in diplomacy, not surprising given that his doctorate was in international relations.
When the Foreign Secretary (FS) position was created in 2019 in Guyana to accommodate Carl Greenidge, who was forced to resign as Foreign Minister on account of his dual nationality, the position was borrowed from India. His duties and responsibilities were never defined, but were somewhat akin to that as defined for the FS in India. And the creation of the post was heavily criticized by the then opposition as well as in the media – creating a sinecure or featherbedding position to accommodate a political appointee.
As a specialist in international relations and foreign policy, my understanding is a Foreign Secretary is the second senior most position in the Ministry of External Affairs. He or she serves in an advisory role on foreign affairs. In India, the position is held by a senior career diplomat schooled in the field. Normally, the person is a graduate of the Foreign Policy Institute or the holder of a post graduate diploma (often a PhD) in international relations as was the case with Jaishankar. In India, the position is not given to a political appointee, but to a career diplomat or a senior person with foreign policy or international relations background. The person is also multi-lingual, since diplomacy requires communicating in several languages. Jaishankar, for example, speaks Russian, Mandarin (Chinese), Hungarian, Japanese, and other languages.
The Foreign Secretary (FS) is a vitally important appointment, as the person has to liaise with the diplomats posted overseas to promote national interests.
The FS is different from the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, or Personal Secretary to the Minister, both of whom also have defined roles and are career diplomats. This is not to say that these positions can’t be held by political appointees or Members of Parliament. Many countries choose MPs as PS.
The FS informs and advises the Minister about issues relating to the interests of the country. The FS organizes diplomatic schedules and programmes and meetings of the Minister in cooperation with the PS. The FS helps to guide policy, easing the burden of the Minister to engage in more politicking to champion the nation’s external interests. The person is very skilled in the field, and is an asset to the Minister and, by extension, the Government.
Yours truly
Dr. Vishnu Bisram
