With his resonant baritone and vision of India, Jaswant Singh left his stamp on a noteworthy era of diplomacy
I first met Jaswant Singh in the days following India’s nuclear tests on May 11 and 13, 1998. As the Ministry of External Affairs official dealing with nuclear issues, I was to draft Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee’s address to Parliament due to open on May 27 while handling the flood of communications with our Embassies and outreach with Delhi-based Embassies and media.
Also read: Diplomacy was Jaswant Singh’s ‘Call to Honour’
Every few days, Mr. Vajpayee would convene a meeting to take stock of the international fallout and Jaswant Singh, then Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, was a permanent invitee. As the draft speech and the nuclear policy paper went back and forth, Mr. Vajpayee’s trust and regard for him soon became evident. Jaswant Singh had spent…