After 34 years with the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), I left the portals of South Block for Dholpur House. But even now, nearly every dream continues to be about diplomacy. The withdrawal feels like a phantom pain – muscle memory disrupted.
What would a random trailer of my professional life include? Images of nearly getting lynched by our own information-starved media during the Agra Summit? The surrealism of holding Ivanka Trump’s hand as she stumbled in Hyderabad? Chairing a UN Security Council Session? Facing down 27 hostile Political Directors of the EU on Ukraine? Defending our HR record in Geneva? Or being on the last, fuel-starved rescue flight out of Yemen, the pilot landing on fumes in Djibouti? Negotiating a pardon for 17 Indians on death row in Dubai? Dinner with Arundhati Roy?
What You Don’t See
Diplomatic work is often reduced to the visible: Joint statements, communiqués, approach papers, briefs, talking points, press releases, and speeches. But they are just 10% of what diplomacy truly is. The remaining 90% is not said; it is done. You can see the polish, but you miss the grind. What the world sees is a calm press briefing. What it misses are the midnight call, the split-second judgment, and the calculation under pressure.