India to send 4 diplomats to New York as it takes seat at UNSC high table

New Delhi: India will increase its diplomatic presence at its mission to the United Nations ahead of taking the role as a non-permanent member at UNSC (United Nations Security Council) from January 1, 2021 for a two-year period. 

India will be getting four more diplomats, who will serve at the Indian mission to the UN in New York —— R Ravindra IFS 1999, Pratik Mathur IFS 2007, Ashish Sharma IFS 2009 and Rajesh Parihar IFS 2009.

The mission is led by Ambassador TS Tirumurti who is India's top diplomat at the Indian mission to UN —India's Permanent Representative (PR) and Ambassador Nagaraj Naidu, Deputy Permanent Representative (DPR), both of which are Ambassador level ranks. 

R Ravindra currently Joint Secretary (Central and West Africa) will be the Political Coordinator for UNSC matter and his designation will be Deputy Permanent Representative. All UNSC member countries have political coordinators, which in India's case will be — R Ravindra. 

Pratik Mathur is currently Deputy Secretary PMO, Ashish Sharma is in Protocol division of MEA and Rajesh Parihar is First Secretary (Economic and Commerce) at the Indian mission in Bejing.

Interesting to know, the mission will have strong Beijing connection with four diplomats being fluent in Mandarin — Deputy envoy Nagaraj Naidu, Madhu Sudan, Pratik Mathur and Siddharth Malik. In fact, Madhu Sudan was Prime Minister Modi's interpreter at the informal Wuhan summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping in April of 2018. 

India has 14 diplomats at its mission in UN and with the addition of 4, strength will increase too 18. Other Indian diplomats are Amarnath, Mayank Singh, Vidisha Maitra, Yedla Umashankar, Deepak Misra,  Paulomi Tripathi, Mijito Vinito, Gopal K Wadhwa with Col. Sandeep Kapoor looking into Peacekeeping and Thirugnana Sambandan into Peacekeeping issues relating to Police.

India got elected to the UNSC in the month of June with the overwhelming support of 184 votes out of 192 countries. It was elected unopposed, as New Delhi was the sole candidate for the Asia-Pacific seat. As the founding member of the world body, India has already served 7 times as a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council.