BS-Seema Nazareth Award: Future of diplomacy will be people-led, says Rao

This year, a Special Mention award was conferred on New Delhi-based Feature Writer Akshara Srivastava, who joined Business Standard in September 2021

In a world where each country exists in its own silos, where “more and more diplomatic openings are mostly shut today… people in ordinary walks of life, out there in the trenches, can break down diplomatic baggage,” said former foreign secretary Nirupama Rao. Rao was speaking at a function organised to confer the 23rd Business Standard-Seema Nazareth Award for Excellence in Journalism 2021.

Through her speech, titled “Reaching out across borders: How citizen diplomacy can work”, Rao made a strong case for “the role that non-state actors can play in mitigating differences and deep-rooted conflicts”. “Diplomacy,” she said, “is people-centred,