Nirupama Rao appointed public policy fellow on India, China relations at US think tank

Washington: Former Indian ambassador to the United States, Nirupama Rao has been appointed public policy fellow to a Washington-based think-tank where she will work on a project on the India-China ties, a top American think-tank has said. Rao will be affiliated with the Wilson Centre’s Asia programme and spend three months in residence at the Wilson Centre, a key non-partisan policy forum for tackling global issues, beginning in June 2017. [caption id=“attachment_3504681” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Nirupama Rao. Reuters[/caption] “She will be working on a book project on the Indo-China relationship and will be contributing to the Wilson Centre’s activities on India, including its India in Asia Initiative,” the Wilson Centre said. The 66-year-old former Indian diplomat was India’s first woman ambassador to China and its first woman spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. She also served as India’s foreign secretary from 2009 to 2011. Following her retirement from public service, Rao received an appointment as Meera and Vikram Gandhi fellow at the India Initiative at the Brown University. She has taught as an undergraduate seminar at the Brown University called ‘India in the World’. The Woodrow Wilson International Centre for scholars is the living, national memorial to United States’ 28th President Woodrow Wilson, created by Congress in 1968 and headquartered in Washington. At the centre, pre-eminent scholars and experts research topics of national and international relevance.