From chanakya to modi evolution of india’s foreign policy

party’s core group comprising Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, Defence
Minister A.K. Antony, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram and close Gandhi
loyalist Ahmed Patel. While the CCS met on Thursdays, it was the Core
Committee’s meeting every Friday that acted as the policymaking body.
The National Advisory Council (NAC) headed by Sonia Gandhi was

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another ‘parallel policy structure’ that further diminished the power of the
cabinet and the prime minister.
27
Narendra Modi does not face Manmohan Singh’s constraints. His
election in 2014 was seen as a personal mandate for drastic changes in
foreign and domestic policies. Modi’s experience as a state chief minister
has made him aware of how the permanent bureaucracy might slow down
policy change. As a pro-business conservative from one of India’s states, he
distrusts the Delhi-based machinery of state and has sought to concentrate
even greater power in his PMO.
Like Nehru, Modi appears passionate about foreign policy and like Rajiv
he is sceptical of the existing set-up and seeks to use his own key advisers.
Like Indira he has a small group of advisers he trusts and like Vajpayee he
has appointed someone dependable as his national security adviser. Modi
prefers to deal directly with his officers, instead of through their ministerial
superiors, a practice similar to that of Nehru. He has also built a direct
relationship with the Indian public, using both traditional media and modern
instruments like social media.
THE ROLE OF PARLIAMENT
India’s parliament plays a lesser role in formulation and execution of
foreign policy than in other parliamentary democracies. This is not what the
founders of modern India envisaged. The record of discussions in the
Constituent Assembly soon after Independence shows that India’s founding
elite wanted parliament to be supreme in the conduct of international
affairs. H.V. Kamath, a member of the Constituent Assembly, argued: ‘I am
sure that Parliament will ultimately decide our international relations. It is
neither the executive nor the President but Parliament which will have the
final word on what out foreign relations are going to be, what our
international policy is going to be.’
28
Kamath’s sentiment was shared by
other Constituent Assembly members and, as a result, Articles 246 and 253

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of the Indian Constitution empowered parliament to legislate all aspects of
foreign affairs including implementation of international treaties,
agreements and conventions.
In practice, however, the conduct of Indian foreign policy rests with the
executive branch of government even as the Ministry of External Affairs is
subject to parliamentary oversight like all government ministries.
Parliamentary oversight is exercised through discussions and debates on the
floor, as well as through question hour – the time set aside during
parliament’s deliberations for MPs to question ministers on their
department’s performance. Parliamentary Committees on External Affairs
and Defence also act as instruments of parliamentary oversight.
The parliament discusses and approves bills introduced by the Ministry
of External Affairs, asks questions on issues and also studies and discusses
the annual report of the Ministry of External Affairs before approving it.
Officials of the Ministry of External Affairs say that a lot of their time is
taken up in preparing answers to questions raised by parliamentarians
during the period when parliament is in session. Questions are sometimes
tied to a media report (say, on Indian hostages in Iraq) while on other
occasions relate to the government’s policy towards a certain country or
specific international issue.
Those who criticize parliamentary oversight note that in almost every
democracy most politicians are oriented towards domestic issues and they
have relatively little knowledge or awareness of foreign affairs. As a result,
parliamentary debates on foreign policy are not always based on hard facts
or an objective assessment of reality. They often become an opportunity for
the opposition to criticize the government or the party in power.
One way of building up a group of politicians who are knowledgeable
about and have experience of foreign policy is through the committee
system. There are two committees for external affairs, the consultative
committee and the standing committee.

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The origins of the consultative committee come from a practice started
by Nehru who used to periodically consult with close parliamentary
colleagues on aspects of foreign policy before he introduced that policy in
parliament.
29
 Lal Bahadur Shastri continued this policy. However, there was
a backlash from members of parliament who demanded the establishment
of formal consultative committees instead of informal consultation. In 1969
parliamentary consultative committees were set up.
The consultative committee is ideally supposed to be comprised of
representatives of all political parties roughly in proportion to their strength
in parliament. The current Parliamentary Consultative Committee on
External Affairs and Overseas Indian Affairs is chaired by the minister for
external affairs and overseas Indian affairs. In addition, there are the two
ministers of state for external affairs and two ex-officio ministers – the
ministers of state for parliamentary affairs. Other members include eleven
members of parliament from the Lok Sabha (Lower House of parliament)
and seventeen members of parliament from the Rajya Sabha (Upper House
of parliament).
30
This committee is consultative and advisory in nature. It is
chaired by the external affairs minister and is a body for the minister to
consult.
The standing committees too have proportionate representation from both
the Houses of parliament. The current Parliamentary Standing Committee
on External Affairs is chaired by a member of the opposition, and has
nineteen members of parliament from the Lok Sabha and eight from the
Rajya Sabha.
31
 The standing committee has the power to call the officials to
testify before it. It looks over the annual reports of the Ministry of External
Affairs, can ask questions about budgetary allocations and also has a veto
over the budget of the Ministry of External Affairs. This committee submits
its annual report to the parliament.
Supporters argue that the standing committee is like a mini-parliament
and through it the parliament exercises control over the conduct of foreign

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policy. They argue that these committees enable detailed discussions of
issues, create an environment where a small number of people, politicians
and bureaucrats, can sit and discuss issues.
Critics assert that what the committee achieves depends upon how
interested parliamentarians are in foreign policy issues and how willing
they are to contribute to discussions on foreign policy. According to former
diplomats most parliamentarians are interested not in broad issues of
foreign and security policy but rather in issues like passports, visas, cultural
exchanges, and of course on any issues to do with India’s neighbours
because all these have a domestic dimension. While the committee can call
officials it does not have the power to call a minister or the prime minister.
According to most analysts, parliamentary oversight is not as intense as it
used to be in the early years. According to academics and former diplomats,
Nehru would always be in parliament to answer questions and would never
miss question hour unless he was out of town. After Nehru, however, most
prime ministers including Indira have preferred to avoid parliament when
they can. Further, while all ministries, including Ministry of External
Affairs, provide answers to parliamentary questions, accountability is not
what it used to be or what it should be. Thus the only time the parliament is
really interested in foreign affairs is when it is a critical issue.
‘THE STEEL FRAME’
Even though India’s prime minister, his cabinet and parliament are the
major pillar of India’s government, it is the professionally trained civil
service that is described as the ‘Steel Frame’ of government in India. That
depiction dates back to a 1922 parliamentary speech by British prime
minister David Lloyd-George. The Indian bureaucratic system and
especially the foreign service is a legacy of British colonial rule with a
history dating back to the British East India Company.

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In 1783, the East India Company’s board of directors had set up what
later became the Indian Foreign Department, the forerunner to today’s
Ministry of External Affairs. In 1843 four key departments were set up at
the federal level: foreign, home, finance and military. After 1858, when the
British government took over running India’s affairs directly, the Indian
Civil Service (ICS) was created, initially with the nomenclature of Imperial
Civil Service and as the British Indian Civil Service after 1886. The civil
service was broken into separate tracks dealing with diplomatic affairs,
home affairs, Indian affairs and colonial affairs, each with its own
designated officers. Candidates for all four services were recruited through
a combined entrance examination and underwent a one-year training
programme at a university in England. The civil services were exclusive to
British men until the early twentieth century when Indians were allowed to
enter. The training period for Indian civil servants was two years.
India was the engine that sustained the British Raj and a huge
bureaucratic establishment was set up to serve the Raj. Schools were set up
to train civil and military officials to maintain the empire’s interests, locally
as well as internationally. Under the East India Company, its military
officers and civilian administrators were company employees and their
roles were interchangeable. The company used the same personnel for
domestic, diplomatic and military work and British policies in relation to
India were framed on the basis of reports of these employees. Even after the
Crown took over from the company, the foreign and political department’s
function was not purely restricted to the foreign affairs of British India but
also included internal and imperial matters.
The Department of External Affairs based in Delhi framed policy for
Persia, Afghanistan, Tibet, Burma, Ceylon and Malaya in addition to
selecting personnel for implementation of these policies. The frontier areas
of the British Raj were also under the jurisdiction of this department. An
Act of the British parliament in 1937 ended this dual responsibility, creating

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a department for domestic affairs and another for external affairs. Until
independence in 1947, the external affairs department was controlled
directly by the Governor General of India. Indians fighting for
independence from the British did not look favourably upon civil servants
advancing the cause of the empire.
At Independence, there were differing views in the Congress party about
whether or not independent India should retain the British civil services.
Nehru supported abolition of the permanent civil service inherited from the
Raj and wanted to replace it with a cadre of political appointees. In his
view, this would be a more democratic system and, in addition to removing
the vestiges of colonialism, would create a more patriotic governing class.
Ironically, it was Patel who argued in favour of retaining the permanent
bureaucracy created so carefully over almost two centuries by the British.
In a letter to Nehru dated 27 April 1948, Patel asserted that ‘an efficient and
disciplined and contented service, assured of its prospects as a result of
diligent and honest work, is a sine qua non of sound administration under a
democratic regime even more than under an authoritarian rule’. 
32
According to Patel, the bureaucracy ‘must be above party’ and a system
should be laid out that minimizes ‘political considerations either in its
recruitment or in its discipline and control’.
33
Patel’s view prevailed and India’s founding fathers were able to rise
above the resentment resulting from mistreatment by the bureaucracy
during colonial rule. India retained the broad British civil service system
though, over time, numerous changes were introduced. Today the Indian
civil services are divided into three broad categories: the Central Services
(which include forty-three services including the Indian Foreign Service),
All India Services (three services, including the Indian Administrative
Service) and the various state services. Upon becoming prime minister,
Nehru appointed Girija Shankar Bajpai, an ICS officer and India’s Agent
General to the US, as the head of the external affairs ministry with the rank

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of Secretary General, the highest possible position under the structure of
civil service left behind by the British. The Indian Foreign Service (IFS)
was formally established in October 1946.
From 1947 to 1964, the senior-most bureaucrat in the Ministry of
External Affairs was the Secretary General. In 1948, the ministry’s
organization was relatively simple. While the Secretary General was in
charge overall, a foreign secretary looked after Europe, the USA, Latin
America, China and Japan and was assisted by two joint secretaries, two
deputy secretaries and two undersecretaries. The Commonwealth secretary
handled relations with the United Kingdom, British dominions and colonies
and Asia.
34
Former foreign secretary Gundevia narrates how the Ministry of External
Affairs functioned in India’s early years. According to him, the Secretary
General presided over a meeting of all senior officials at 10:30 a.m. every
morning. Secretaries and joint secretaries ‘trooped in strict order of
precedence and sat down in strict order of precedence and marched out in
the same order when the session was over. It was a coordinated meeting at
which, mostly, telegrams that had come in overnight were discussed. You
got precise instructions, always, from the Secretary General on what to do
and what not to do.’ 
35
After Nehru’s death in 1964, the office of Secretary General was
abolished. The administrative head of the Ministry of External Affairs since
then is the foreign secretary. There were initially two other secretaries,
earlier called secretary EA I (External Affairs I) and secretary EA II
(External Affairs II) later redesignated secretary, East and secretary, West.
The two other secretaries in the current organigram who are relatively
recent appointees are secretary DPA & ER (Development Partnership
Administration and Economic Relations) and special secretary (Americas),
indicating the increasing importance of the United States and the Western
hemisphere in Indian foreign policy.

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An important but less well-known aspect of India’s foreign policy is
India’s aid for other developing countries. The annual budget outlay for the
Ministry of External Affairs for 2014–15 was US $2.3 billion (INR
14,370.39 crore), of which 64 per cent accounted for aid given to other
countries under the International Technical and Economic Cooperation
(ITEC) programme.
36
For the year 2015–16, India’s development aid budget
stood at US $1.6 billion, most of which, around 84 per cent, was allocated
to South Asian countries. The budget apportioned 63 per cent of the aid for
Bhutan, while giving Afghanistan 7 per cent, Sri Lanka 5 per cent, Nepal 4
per cent, Bangladesh 3 per cent and the Maldives 2 per cent.
37
Pakistan is
the only South Asian country that does not accept Indian aid.
Within the Ministry for External Affairs, responsibilities for managing
relations with various countries are divided on a territorial basis between
the three senior-most civil servants – the foreign secretary, secretary (East)
and secretary (West). As part of a tradition started many years ago, until
recently the foreign secretary dealt directly with the United Nations and the
permanent members of the UN Security Council (the US, the UK, China,
Russia and France) as well as India’s South Asian neighbours. Secretary
(West’s) remit is Europe, Latin America, North America (but not the US),
Africa and the Gulf while Secretary (East’s) responsibility covers East Asia
but not China.
This tradition has not always been strictly adhered to and over time,
foreign secretaries have accumulated more subjects and regions under their
direct control. Modi has presided over subtle changes in the management of
the Ministry of External Affairs, allowing greater concentration of
policymaking at the apex of the pyramid. For example, Foreign Secretary
Jaishankar delegated the UN portfolio to Secretary DPA & ER Sujata
Mehta to free the foreign secretary to focus on India’s pursuit of a
permanent seat on the Security Council. This marked separating India’s
larger political objectives from the humdrum of India’s role at the UN and

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was interpreted by one analyst as a sign ‘that old turf and territories may no
longer be sacrosanct’.
38
Notwithstanding the changes in the foreign office’s organization at
various times, the training of civil servants remains as stringent as it was
under colonial days. In case of the Indian Foreign Service,
Bandyopadhyaya points out, well trained professional diplomats are crucial
for India’s international relations. ‘However rational the broad goals and
principles of foreign policy determined by the political executive may be,’
he writes, ‘there will be a wide gap between theory and practice if the
personnel responsible for the various major aspects of policy are not
properly selected, trained and utilized.’
39
 Since 1926, recruitment of India’s
civil servants has taken place through the Union Public Service
Commission (UPSC) – formerly Federal Public Service Commission – an
independent body that conducts annual examinations for recruitment for
various Indian administrative services, including the Indian Foreign Service
and the Indian Administrative Service (IAS).
Once selected, new recruits (or probationers as they are called) train first
along with colleagues from other services at the Lal Bahadur Shastri
National Academy of Administration in Mussourie before heading to the
Foreign Service Institute (FSI) in Delhi for specialized training. The
training period lasts for three years after which each officer is assigned a
compulsory foreign language. After a brief attachment to the Ministry of
External Affairs in New Delhi, the young IFS officer is posted to an Indian
mission based on language skills. At the end of the three-year training
period, officers must pass an examination before being allowed to continue
further in the service.
British India had no embassies but at the end of World War II, two offices
of agent general were set up, one in the US and one in China, whose duties
were limited to consular affairs including issuance of visas. After 1947,
India’s international presence grew rapidly and by 1953 India had opened

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sixty missions, and forty-two countries had their diplomatic representatives
in Delhi. By the 1970s India had 112 missions abroad, which grew to 140
foreign missions during the 1990s. As of 2015 India has 162 embassies and
consulates abroad.
40
Retired diplomats often complain that, unlike the United States and some
others, India lacks a formal system to train its diplomats for service in
specific countries. Training by the Ministry of External Affairs provides a
broad framework, leaving several things – such as learning languages, local
customs and history – to the discretion of individual diplomats. Envoys are
supposed to return to Delhi before taking their next appointment but it is not
mandatory. Most diplomats lament the relatively small size of the foreign
service, which does not allow foreign service officers reorientation time
between postings. They argue that diplomats must be given an opportunity
to return to Delhi and brainstorm with key stakeholders (not only at the
ministry and the PMO but also at other ministries) during and between
serving abroad. The counter-argument is that the ministry cannot
micromanage a diplomat’s understanding of the country where he or she
serves and officers must be allowed to learn on their jobs.
There are approximately 770 IFS officers manning 162 Indian missions
and posts abroad as well as at headquarters in New Delhi. For a country of
its size and the demands of global engagement, India has a relatively small
foreign service. The Ministry of External Affairs also has 400 support staff,
including interpreters and lawyers who are not foreign service officers.
These numbers do not compare favourably with other major developing
countries. China has 6,000 diplomats while Brazil’s foreign service
comprises 3,000.
41
‘For every Indian diplomat there are four Brazilian
diplomats,’ Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon told a parliamentary
committee in 2007. ‘For every Indian diplomat there are seven Chinese
diplomats,’ he said and added, ‘Now we might be wonderful and very

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efficient, but we are not that efficient or that good. The strain is telling on
us.’
42
The relatively smaller foreign service is the result of decisions made right
after Independence. At that time, Indian leaders were more concerned about
India’s domestic problems than foreign policy and were reluctant to commit
too many resources for the conduct of external relations. As early as the
1950s, a foreign secretary noted: ‘No one in Delhi was prepared to accept
that there had to be a reasonable increase particularly of senior posts in the
Ministry for the maintenance of a balanced ratio between the posts abroad
and the officer cadre at home.’
43
Nehru, while keen to expand the number of
Indian missions abroad so that India’s international presence grew, was not
in favour of the Ministry of External Affairs ‘bulging at the seams’.
44
Starting off as a small elite service, the IFS only recruited 5–10 people
each year for several years. The exclusivity and small number of Indian
diplomats led to the view that they were better than others. Quality was
believed to be a substitute for numbers. Over time, the foreign service has
realized their personnel crunch. Had the Ministry of External Affairs been
strategic consistently and added to their numbers on a regular basis, India
could have doubled the number of its diplomats in fifty years, keeping pace
with demand. Bad personnel management for decades has led to the
difficulties Shivshankar Menon identified before the parliamentary
committee sixty years after Independence. The Indian government has now
decided to double the number of people working for the foreign ministry to
1,500 and recruitment rates have now gone up. Thirty-two ‘officer trainee
diplomats’ were inducted in 2014, as against 8–15 some two decades ago.
45
Increasing recruitment is only one way to boost the size of the service on
a permanent basis; another could be lateral entry of candidates for specific
positions. The Indian Foreign Service has generally opposed lateral entrants
into diplomatic jobs from other services or from universities and think
tanks. Critics of inducting non-foreign service officials argue that it does

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not make up for the paucity of well-trained diplomats. Opening the doors
for such induction would only open doors for patronage politics polluting
the purity of a highly admired professional service. While opposing experts
from other fields being assigned diplomatic tasks, Indian Foreign Service
officers often favour training of their own in a broader range of technical
skills from energy issues to cultural diplomacy.
In an effort to bring fresh blood into the Ministry of External Affairs, the
Modi administration is encouraging lateral entry. In a deposition before a
parliamentary committee in 2015, Foreign Secretary Jaishankar stated that
the MEA would fill positions in its Policy Planning Division by recruiting
from outside the government.
46
It is unlikely, however, that the Modi government will revert to
appointing too many outside candidates in senior diplomatic positions. The
ambition of every foreign service officer is to rise to the position of
ambassador, and most capable officers manage to fulfil that ambition in
India’s case. To ensure that it continues to attract talent and that entrants
believe they will all one day become ambassadors there is an internal
reluctance to either recruit too many candidates or appoint non-career
diplomats as ambassadors. Unlike several countries, India tends to limit the
number of political appointees it sends as ambassadors. The vast majority
of Indian ambassadors are career diplomats. The only exception until
recently were ambassadorial appointments in the US, the UK and the Soviet
Union, which were offered to ruling party politicians. In recent years that
has changed, opening these previously ‘political’ positions for career
diplomats.
In the first few decades after Independence the people who joined the
services, especially the Indian Foreign Service, were driven either by their
passion for foreign service or a desire to follow parents who had served in
the civil service under the British. The Indian Foreign Service was
considered a more exclusive service as those ranking highest in the

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competitive examination were selected for foreign service. K. Shankar
Bajpai, who served as ambassador to the United States and also as foreign
secretary narrated to the author that he joined the service because he was
attracted to it even though his father (Girija Shankar Bajpai) wanted him to
become a lawyer.
47
 One of the lures of the Indian Foreign Service was the
prospect of living in other countries and also to study in the world’s elite
universities. In his 2016 book