Advancing India’s conversations with the world...
Advancing India’s conversations with the world...
Mission statement Established in 2006, the Public Diplomacy Division of India’s Ministry of External Affairs seeks to create a better understanding of India and its foreign policy concerns. We are working to put in place a system that enables us to engage more effectively with our citizens in India and with global audiences that have an interest in foreign policy issues. At the Public Diplomacy Division, we produce publications, documentary films and other material that enables us to key facets of our diverse nation. We also publish the India Perspectives magazine in 17 languages and distribute it in 160 countries around the globe through our diplomatic missions. We partner with major domestic and international universities, think tanks and research organizations to organize seminars and conferences on subjects that are relevant to India’s concerns, host delegations from various countries and organizations to provide them with a broad-based exposure to India and organize lectures and other events within India with the objective of fostering a more informed discourse on India’s foreign policy. We also service India’s missions and posts around the world to enable them to project India more effectively. A key area of our focus is to develop effective Web 2.0 strategies and utilize a full range of social media tools that enable us to engage with diverse communities in India and overseas that have an interest in foreign policy issues.
Publications and Music
Documentaries and Film Festivals
We commission coffee table books on India for presentation by our Heads of Mission to local dignitaries. We also produce attractively packaged selections of Indian music ranging from classical and instrumental to popular Bollywood songs. Two of these, titled Music as Therapy and Six Decades of Bollywood Music have been especially popular with audiences in a number of countries.
We commission documentary films that create a better understanding of different facets of India emphasising, in particular, on our pluralistic society, our vibrant democracy, our rich cultural heritage, the dynamic growth of our economy, our spirit of enterprise and innovation and our development partnerships with key parts of the world. We have acquired non-commercial screening rights in multiple languages for select films and have been providing these to our diplomatic missions for organizing Indian film festivals. These seem to go down extremely well with local audiences and in recent months, we have supported such festivals in Algiers, Brasilia and Sao Paulo, Mexico City, Kuala Lumpur and several other capitals. Recognizing that a similar role can also be played by popular television serials, we are also working to make these available to overseas television channels.
India Perspectives
Seminars & Conferences
India Perspectives is the flagship publication of the Ministry of External Affairs. We publish it in 17 languages and it is distributed by our missions to appreciative audiences in 160 countries around the world.
We partner with major domestic and international universities, think tanks and research organizations to organize seminars and conferences on subjects that are relevant to India’s concerns.
The Distinguished Lecture Series
Visitors’ Programme
The MEA Distinguished Lecture Series in India’s Foreign Policy was launched in February 2010. It involves lectures at major Indian universities by noted Indian diplomats on major foreign policy themes identified by the universities themselves. Universities have welcomed the programme as an important new element in the discourse on foreign policy and as a genuine endeavour to interpret and explain major directions of India’s foreign policy. By bringing the lecture series online, we hope to engender a much greater citizen participation in the programme.
With a view to providing key decision-makers and influencers with a better understanding of India, we are expanding our Visitors’ programme. A typical programme includes a couple of meetings with senior government representatives, briefings on the economy at a major chamber of commerce like CII or FICCI, an interactive session at a think tank like IDSA or ORF that explains the security environment in India’s neighbourhood and a visit to a major city outside Delhi. Visits to the Indian Parliament and other elements of the programme are tailored in accordance with the specific interests of the delegates.
Digital Diplomacy In recent years, the emergence of Web 2.0 tools and social media sites offer governments a unique possibility to not only disseminate their information efficiently through these channels but also to receive feedback and respond to concerns. In India, the Public Diplomacy Division has taken the lead in this area by establishing an interactive website, a Twitter channel, a Facebook page, a YouTube channel, a Blogspot page and a presence on online publishing sites like Scribd and Issuu. We are utilizing these channels to establish a more effective engagement with younger audiences and also to create a space for genuine narratives about India’s development partnerships, the extent and reach of its soft power and about the creative work being done by our diplomatic missions.
Advancing India’s Conversations with the World
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