Who Is Gaitri Kumar?

rom the time The Hindu began publishing the Wikileaks cables on India, the chattering classes in Delhi have been asking: just who is Gaitri Kumar? A joint secretary who headed the Americas division between 2006 and 2010, the crucial years during which the Indo-US nuclear deal was negotiated, Gaitri is quoted telling an American official to convey to the Union ministry of external affairs (MEA) any complaints his country had about the functioning of Hardeep Puri, who had then been appointed as India’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations (see cables). Another cable says a woman official, presumably Gaitri Kumar, had informed the American embassy in New Delhi about Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s impending visit to New Delhi even before the information was made public or conveyed to other government agencies.

These two cables have prompted some, including a few in the media, to ask: was she an American mole in the Indian system? MEA officials are aghast at such speculation, vouching not only for her integrity but also insisting that she, like all faceless bureaucrats, diligently implemented what the prime minister’s office wanted. To bolster their case, they point out that she couldn’t have been privy to the information about Ahmadinejad’s visit unless it had been conveyed to her by the joint secretary heading the Pakistan-Afghanistan-Iran division, who wasn’t required to tip her about it. MEA officials, therefore, conclude: the decision to convey the information about the Iranian president’s visit had to be of the top political brass. “The nuclear deal was at a crucial stage, and they didn’t want to piss off the Americans,” says an official.

A speaker of Portuguese (every Indian foreign service official is expected to specialise in one foreign language), this 1986 batch officer is currently the deputy chief of mission in the Indian embassy in Paris.