S Jaishankar On Phone Call From PM For Cabinet Post

S Jaishankar was Foreign Minister from January 2015 to January 2018.

New Delhi:

Noting that he belongs to a family of officials and political opportunity as a union minister came like a lightning bolt in 2019, Foreign Minister S Jaishankar said today that his father, Dr. K Subrahmanyam was sacked as Minister of Defense Production, by former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi shortly after her return to power in 1980 and he was replaced during the Rajiv Gandhi era with one of his subordinates becoming Cabinet Minister.

In an interview with ANI, Mr. Jaishankar talked about his journey from diplomacy to politics and said he always aspired to be the best officer and was promoted to the position of Foreign Minister.

Mr. Jaishankar was Foreign Minister from January 2015 to January 2018 and previously held key ambassadorial positions to China and the United States. His father, K Subrahmanyam, who died in 2011, is considered one of India’s most prominent national security strategists.

“I want to be the best diplomat. And in my opinion, the definition of the best thing you can do is to be secretary of state. We have that in our family too, I wouldn’t call it that. pressure, but we all know that my father, an official, became a Secretary but he was fired. At that time, he was probably the youngest Secretary in the government. Janata in 1979,” he said.

“In 1980, he was Minister of Defense Production. In 1980 when Indira Gandhi was re-elected, he was the first Minister that she fired. And he was the most knowledgeable person people would talk about the nation. room,” he added.

Mr Jaishankar said his father was also a very upright man, “maybe that caused the problem, I don’t know”.

“But the reality is that as a person, he found his career in the bureaucracy, really put on hold. And after that, he never became a minister again. He was fired. substituted during Rajiv Gandhi for one of his subordinates who became cabinet secretaries That’s something he feels…we rarely talk about it So he is very , very proud that my brother became a secretary,” said Dr Jaishankar.

He said that he became the Secretary of the government after his father passed away.

“He passed away in 2011, at that time I had what you call Grade 1, was like a secretary….like an ambassador. I wasn’t a secretary, I became like that after He passed away. For us, then the goal was to become a secretary. As I said I have achieved that goal. In 2018, I was very happy to walk in the sunset.. .but, in the end, I didn’t walk in the sunset but entered Tata Sons I did my fair share there I liked them, I thought they liked me Then all of a sudden Now the political opportunity for me is something I need to think about because I am simply not prepared for it….So I briefly thought about it. …”, Mr Jaishankar said when asked about his journey from official to cabinet minister.

Reflecting on the phone call from the Prime Minister inviting him to join the cabinet led by Narendra Modi in 2019, Mr Jaishankar said it was a surprise. “It didn’t come to my mind at all, I don’t think it entered the minds of anyone else in my circle,” he said, referring to his inductance into the union cabinet. .

“When I walked in, I have to honestly say I was very uncertain myself. I’ve been following politicians all my life. By the way, one of the things you can do in the foreign service is be real friends. the thing that can do more than other services is, you’re looking at politicians up close because you’re meeting them abroad, you’re working with them closely, advising them. one thing to watch but actually get into politics, become a cabinet member, represent the Rajya Sabha, you know when I was elected I wasn’t even a member of Parliament yet. this happens one after another. I slip into it sometimes without knowing it. You learn by watching other people,” he added.

Mr Jaishankar, who joined India’s foreign ministry in 1977, said he “looks very carefully at what people are doing both in my party and in other parties”. He is a BJP member in Rajya Sabha from Gujarat.

In response to a question about his time as a cabinet minister, he said the past four years have been very, very interesting.

“I don’t think it’s too important to win friends. Yes, that helps when you’re a diplomat, in a sense I’ve been trained so I would say get along, make the most of it. Some of that Also, different people are made in different ways. You’ll see, I very rarely get into anything private with people, even when I do. sometimes provoked I think people are just made in different ways I’ll say this, it’s going to be four years this summer It’s been a very, very exciting four years when I look back in these four years, for me, it was really four years of very intense learning, getting to a state where I really had very little knowledge,” said Mr Jaishankar.

He said when he became a minister, he had the choice whether to join a political party or not.

“First, this government, this cabinet is very much like a group cabinet. You don’t do your own thing here. You can come from a background, you can come from a lineage, but this idea is you. will do your domain as you say we are technocrats. nor am I a member of a political party. I had the choice of whether or not I joined a political party. There was no coercion in that, no one mentioned the subject. That’s left to me. I joined because, one, when you join a group, you join that group wholeheartedly. That’s where you give your best and get the best support. .”

“And second, I’ve really pondered what it means to actually join a political party. It’s not a decision I take lightly. I’ve been someone who has studied and analyzed politics all my life. That’s very important to me, so I joined because today I truly believe that this is the party that best captures India’s sentiments, interests and aspirations. And I joined. into other matters because again, one of the differences going from bureaucracy, from a department or service to politics, you learn so much more when you’re a member of the cabinet,” he added.

He says there is a different level of exposure as a union minister than in the bureaucracy.

“Your exposure, each cabinet meeting… let’s say there are 10 items, maybe agriculture, maybe infrastructure. But you get cabinet notes, you read the notes. , you’re interested, you’re going to research a little bit more, so your interests will expand. When your interests expand, and you go out there and talk to people, that will show.”

When asked if there is any difference in Dr Jaishankar’s way of thinking and acting as a diplomat, a minister and a politician, he said there are some challenges for him. with him personally.

“In a way, it’s like different lives. You have to understand the challenge it presents to me personally because I come from a family of officials. My father is an official. I have a brother. My son was an official, my grandfather was an official, bureaucracy, and uncles were there. So our world, if I may tell you this way, is very very bureaucratic. Our goal, our dream is bureaucracy.”

Mr. Jaishankar said every major issue has some political angle which a minister would tend to see much quicker than an official.

“It’s another world, another responsibility. I put it on people like this. I could have sat for 40 years in the gallery of Congress. It’s not like being on the floor of Congress. when I was… Sushma Swaraj was my Minister As Foreign Minister we used to talk a lot. …I trust that I have a minister and a Prime Minister above me, who will ultimately shoulder that political responsibility,” he said.

“Now, come May 2019, that political responsibility is mine. It’s a completely different area. As a Minister you have to look at it not by department, there could be something. which, for example, exports wheat to a number of countries”. nation. As a secretary, I would say that the relationship of a country is very important. But as a Minister, I have to say what is the price of wheat in my country, what are the domestic concerns out there? Who else do we need to talk to? Dr Jaishankar said in a wide-ranging podcast interview with ANI’s Editor, Smita Prakash, “every issue, every major issue has some sort of political angle to which a Minister would tend to tend to. much quicker to see than an official.

When asked if it was a challenge, he said, “yes, sure”.

(Except for the title, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from an aggregated feed.)