Ruchi Ghanashyam next envoy to UK

Smita Sharma 

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 28

Senior diplomat Ruchi Ghanashyam has been appointed as India's next High Commissioner to United Kingdom. A 1982-batch India Foreign Service officer, Ghanshyam is currently serving as Secretary West at Ministry of External Affairs in Delhi. 

Ghanashyam will be India's second woman high commissioner in London in nearly six decades after Vijaya Laxmi Pandit who served as High Commissioner from 1954 to 1961. Ghanashyam will takes over the assignment shortly from serving envoy Yashvardhan Sinha.

Ghanashyam will have her task cut out at a time when India and UK have been at loggerheads over the Returns Bill dealing with deportation of illegal immigrants as well as the ground being allowed by London to pro-Khalistan outfits inciting anti-India sentiments. Uncertainty also prevails over trade investment issues as the Theresa May government continues to fight it out politically while negotiating Brexit terms and conditions.

Ghanashyam has previously served as Joint Secretary and Additional Secretary heading the Europe West Division in MEA. Her overseas assignments include serving as High Commissioner in Ghana, concurrently accredited to Burkina Faso, Togo and Sierra Leone from 2008 to 2011 and Minister in the Permanent Mission of India to UN in New York prior to that. During her diplomatic career she also served as Director (Pakistan) in Delhi from 2000 to 2004 having earlier served as Counsellor (Political, Press & Info) in the High Commission of India in Islamabad.

Meanwhile, the UK government has announced next edition of the High Commissioner for a Day contest to celebrate International Day of the Girl Child on October 11. British envoy to India Dominic Asquith today launched the competition by calling on young women aged 18-23 to submit a short video on social media explaining what gender equality means to them. The winner gets to don the High Commissioner's hat for a day. "We want to celebrate this important day by demonstrating to young women that anything is possible, and giving them a platform to talk about the important issue of girls' rights," said Dominic Asquith.