India’s ambassador to Nepal, Vinay Mohan Kwatra, will succeed Shringla as Foreign Secretary

The government named India’s ambassador to Nepal, Vinay Mohan Kwatra, as the next Foreign Secretary on Monday. When incumbent Harsh Vardhan Shringla retires on April 30, he will take over as Foreign Secretary.

Kwatra is a member of the Indian Foreign Service (IFS) with nearly 32 years of experience in a variety of roles. From 2015 to 2017, he worked in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s office before becoming India’s ambassador to France. After joining the IFS in 1988, he worked as the third secretary and then the second secretary in India’s Permanent Mission in Geneva until 1993, where, in addition to learning French, he handled UN specialised agencies and the Human Rights Commission’s work. During this time, he also earned an International Relations diploma from Geneva’s Graduate School of International Studies.

He worked as a desk officer at the headquarters dealing with the United Nations between 1993 and 2003, and then in diplomatic missions in South Africa and Uzbekistan. He worked in the Beijing embassy as a counsellor and later as the deputy chief of mission between 2003 and 2006. He was the head of the Trade, Economy, and Finance Bureau at the SAARC Secretariat in Nepal from 2006 to 2010.

He was the minister (Commerce) in the embassy in Washington from May 2010 to July 2013. Kwatra served as the head of the Policy Planning & Research Division of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) from July 2013 to October 2015, and later as the head of the Americas Division of the foreign ministry, where he was responsible for India’s relations with the United States and Canada.

Kwatra worked as a joint secretary in India’s Prime Minister’s Office from October 2015 to August 2017. He served as India’s Ambassador to France from August 2017 to February 2020. From March 2020 to the present, he has served as India’s ambassador to Nepal.

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