Indira Gandhi deposed my father as Union Secretary, and he was succeeded by Rajiv Gandhi: Jaishankar.

Noting that he comes from a family of bureaucrats and that his ambition had been to become a secretary, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar recalled how his father, Dr. K Subrahmanyam, was removed as Secretary of Defence Production by former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi soon after she returned to power in 1980, and how he was replaced as Cabinet Secretary during the Rajiv Gandhi era by someone younger to him.

In an interview with ANI, Jaishankar discussed his transition from foreign service to politics, describing how the opportunity to serve as a Union minister came as a “bolt from the blue” in 2019. Jaishankar, Foreign Secretary from January 2015 to January 2018, stated that he aspired to be the “best officer” and wanted to be elevated to the position of Foreign Secretary.

“I wanted to be the best foreign service officer in the world. And, in my opinion, becoming a foreign secretary was the pinnacle of achievement. In our household, there was also, I won’t say pressure, but we were all aware that my father, a bureaucrat, had become a Secretary but had been removed from his position. In 1979, he was probably the youngest Secretary in the Janata government,” Jaishankar told ANI’s, Smita Prakash.

After his father died in 2011, Jaishankar stated that he had become a government secretary. “I had a Grade 1 job, which is like a secretary….like an ambassador. I didn’t become a secretary before he died; I became one after he died. The goal for us at the time was to become secretaries. As I previously stated, I had met that objective. In 2018, I was looking forward to walking away into the sunset…but instead, I walked into Tata Sons! I was making a significant contribution there. I liked them, and they liked me. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, a political opportunity presented itself.