Ambassador Kishan Rana tells the story of Indian diplomacy

Indian Ambassador Kishan Rana has published a new book titled "Diplomacy at the cutting edge" (Manas Publications, 2016) with a complete personal narrative of his 35 years of Indian Foreign service. But the book goes beyond diplomatic memoirs: it also gives an original insight on the practice of diplomacy.

As Prof. Geoffrey Berridge writes in his presentation: "Kishan Rana is not only a prominent scholar-diplomat but also a dedicated and successful teacher of diplomatic practice, this memoir .... uses the different stages of a long and varied career chiefly to ponder at length and then draw lessons form them. It is written in his usual crisp and fluent style and I recommend it most warmly".

Many of Kishan Rana’s books, such as Diplomacy of the 21st Century (2011) and The Contemporary Embassy (2013), are already used as textbooks at several universities. “Diplomacy at the cutting edge” will probably be another one of them.

Kishan S. Rana graduated in Economics (BA Hons and MA) from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi and served in the Indian Foreign Service from 1965 to 1995. He was India's Ambassador/High Commissioner to Algeria, Czechoslovakia, Kenya, Mauritius, and Germany, and was on staff of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1981-82. He currently holds positions as Professor Emeritus of DiploFoundation, Malta and Geneva and is an Honorary Fellow at the Institute of Chinese Studies, Delhi. He is also an archives by-fellow at Churchill College, Cambridge, and Public Policy Scholar at Woodrow Wilson Centre, Washington DC. He serves currently as guest faculty at the Diplomatic Academy, Vienna, and was a Commonwealth Adviser to the Namibia Foreign Ministry in 2000-01.

A successful novelist: the Indian diplomat Vikas Swarup

Vikas Swarup is one of the most famous Indian diplomat-writers, very well known for his two novels "Q & A" and "Six Suspects".
His first novel Q&A (published in 2005) is particularly famous because the film version of the book, titled ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, directed by Danny Boyle, has won more than 70 awards including four Golden Globes and 8 Oscars, including Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Picture. The novel has also been adapted for a stage musical and a radio play.
The book "Q&A" (already translated in 42 languages) opens in a jail cell in Mumbai, India, where Ram Mohammad Thomas is being held after correctly answering all twelve questions on India's biggest quiz show, Who Will Win a Billion? It is hard to believe that a poor orphan who has never read a newspaper or gone to school could win such a contest. But through a series of exhilarating tales Ram explains to his lawyer how episodes in his life gave him the answer to each question. Ram takes us on an amazing review of his own history -- from the day he was found as a baby in the clothes donation box of a Delhi church to his employment by a faded Bollywood star to his adventure with a security-crazed Australian army colonel to his career as an overly creative tour guide at the Taj Mahal.
The second novel "Six supects" (2008) is a multi layered story about crime and corruption in modern day India and it is based on true life events. Vivek 'Vicky' Rai, the playboy son of Cabinet Minister is dead, killed at his farmhouse at a party he had thrown to celebrate his acquittal. Six guests are discovered with guns in their possession - and each one is equally likely to have pulled the trigger. Who are these six suspects? And what were they doing in the farmhouse that night?
Vikas Swarup was born in Allahabad (India) in a family of lawyers. After his schooling, Vikas attended Allahabad University and studied History, Psychology and Philosophy. After graduating with distinction, he joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1986, motivated by an interest in international relations and a desire to explore different cultures. In his diplomatic career, Vikas has been posted to various countries such as Turkey (1987-1990), the United States (1993-1997) Ethiopia (1997-2000), the United Kingdom (2000-2003) and South Africa (2006-2009). Since August 2009, he is the Consul General of India in Osaka-Kobe, Japan. He has written for TIME, The Guardian, The Telegraph (UK), Outlook magazine (India) and Liberation (France). Apart from reading, he enjoys listening to music and playing cricket, tennis and table tennis.

Personal website: http://www.vikasswarup.net

Book on Asian Diplomacy by Kishan Rana

The last book published by a former Indian diplomat, Kishan Rana, is titled "Asian diplomacies. The foreign ministries of China, Japan, Singapore & Thailand" (Diplo, 2007, pp.246).
The book contains information and unique data on the structures, operation and the working style of the foreign ministries of the five key countries in Asia, mentioned in the title. The book offers a comparative examination of the performance of these foreign ministries together with new insight into the countries covered, as also for its examination of the cultural dimension of the diplomatic process.
A brief quote from the Introduction: "World Affairs are more fluid than before and therefore demand greater attention. Diplomacy is globalised. One consequence is that almost all foreign ministries are reorganizing themselves, and fine tuning their diplomatic machinery to deliver improved performance. Such MFA adaptation-transformation-reform is a recurring theme in this study."
Further information on the book and order form for the book are available at the page http://www.diplomacy.edu/Books/publications.asp