Diplomat Navtej Sarna treads the road less travelled - P. Jayaram  

New Delhi, June 8 (IANS) Most Indian diplomats, like their counterparts elsewhere, are happy treading the safe, well-beaten track, but some have shown a creative passion beyond the clinking crystals and bubbly parties. 

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) hitting bookshop shelves this week. 

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 IANS in an interview. 

The book is the result of three years of labour and 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. 

This is Sarna's second book and coming after a decade's interval. The first was "Polish Folktales". 

Writing has been a passion for Sarna since his days as a law student of Delhi University in the late 1970s. His penned works include an article on coffee houses all over the world, human interest stories, travel pieces, middles, book reviews and several short stories. 

What makes IFS officers take to creative hobbies? 

"To begin with a lot of people who enter the profession are fond of writing, philosophy, painting, singing. And, the foreign service offers that kind of an exposure - a kaleidoscope of experiences which can jog creativity," says Sarna. 

The book will be formally released at a function later this month. 

Another book by Sarna is due for release in October. Also published by Penguin under their non-fiction series on Indian saints, the "Book of Nanak", is about the life and times of Guru Nanak.