Diplomat used D.C. weekends to write a novel - P. Jayaram

Most Indian diplomats, like their counterparts elsewhere, are happy treading the safe, well-beaten track, but some have shown a creative passion. 

The latest to join the list of creative diplomats is Indian Foreign Service (IFS) officer Navtej Sarna, joint secretary, external publicity, Ministry of External Affairs, and its amiable spokesman. 

Sarna has joined the growing number of Indian writers of fiction in English, with his ‘We Weren’t Lovers Like That’ (Penguin) which is slated to be released later this month. 

The story revolves around Aftab Chandra, a middle-aged executive and, in the words of Sarna, the “intricate unpredictable nature of human relations, choices we make, regrets we have, how we deal with possible mistakes. It’s about the mechanical nature of today’s world, nostalgia for a world which seems to have been lost to us forever, a simpler more joyful world.” 

The book is also about “facing one’s weaknesses and daring to hope even when everything seems to be lost,” Sarna told Indo-Asian News Service. 

The book is the result of three years of labor and was written during his stint as minister (press) at the Indian Embassy in Washington before he took up the present assignment. 

“It was written before I joined here. I couldn’t have done it here,” says Sarna, referring to the demands of a job as foreign ministry spokesman. 

The Washington job also was “pretty demanding,” the only difference being Sarna had relatively free weekends. Sarna says he is not a regimented writer. 

“I write between demands of the job and demands of the urge to write... sometimes at two in the morning.” His wife Avina and children --- Satyajit and Nooreen --- did not mind. “They were very understanding. They knew I had to get it out of my system,” says Sarna. “It obviously meant I had less time for them. Still they allowed me to tap along at my keyboard.” 

Understandably, the first critic of the book has been his wife, “who has read the book in the making” and given her frank opinion as only a wife can. 

Former foreign secretary S K Singh came to the defence of the part-time authors.

"This kind of thing applies to most foreign services," the former chief diplomat said.

"The point is that these people have a very broad interest and great ability to look at things outside their area of expertise.

"It is a very good way of diverting the mind and as Indian ambassador to Afghanistan I used to roam the bazaars of Kabul. Today I have a priceless library about rugs because you cannot go around collecting things in ignorance."

However, political analyst Anand Ojha said the diplomats should find more work to do.

"There are two categories in the Indian civil service. One is just bored with toasting glasses and the other is bored out of their minds and hence such calls of poesy," said the Delhi University academic.