Policy Update
Rakhi Kumari
Introduction
Every year on June 24, the world observes the International Day of Women in Diplomacy. But beyond the official statements and ceremonial acknowledgments, one question remains uncomfortably relevant: how many women are genuinely shaping the foreign policy decisions that define how nations relate to each other?
For India, the answer is layered. The Indian Foreign Service has been welcoming more women than ever before — recruitment numbers have climbed steadily over the past decade. But somewhere between the training institute and the ambassador’s chair, this progress seems to stall. Women are entering the service in stronger numbers, yet fewer of them are leading India’s missions abroad today than five years ago. That gap does not fix itself — and one day a year is not enough to address it.
Background
The International Day of Women in Diplomacy was established by the United Nations General Assembly through resolution A/RES/76/269, adopted on 20 June 2022 (United Nations, 2022). The resolution called on member states, UN bodies, and civil society organisations to use the occasion to raise awareness about women’s contributions to diplomacy — and about the persistent gaps that remain.
The global picture that prompted the resolution has not changed dramatically since. As of January 2025, only 25 countries had a woman serving as head of state or government (United Nations, 2025) More strikingly, 113 countries had never had a woman in that role. Across cabinet positions worldwide, women held just 22.9 percent of ministerial posts — with foreign affairs and defence portfolios being among the least diverse. In ambassadorial roles specifically, the global average reached 22 percent in 2022, up from 16 percent in 2018 (United Nations, 2025). The numbers have moved, but not nearly fast enough.
In peace negotiations, the numbers are even more sobering. Between 1992 and 2019, women made up only 13 percent of negotiators, 6 percent of mediators, and 6 percent of signatories in formal peace processes (UN Women, 2019). This is not just an equity issue. Research from the UN and independent policy institutes consistently shows that peace agreements reached with women at the table tend to be more inclusive and more durable. In other words, underrepresentation in diplomacy is not merely unfair — it is costly.
Functioning
The Indian Foreign Service is India’s premier diplomatic cadre, responsible for staffing embassies, high commissions, and consulates across the world, as well as key roles within the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi. Entry is through the UPSC Civil Services Examination — one of the most demanding competitive exams in the country.
After selection, IFS officers undergo structured training at the Foreign Service Institute before being assigned their first posting. From there, careers move through a defined hierarchy — third secretary, second secretary, first secretary, counsellor, minister — before reaching the senior levels of Deputy Chief of Mission and eventually Ambassador or High Commissioner. The apex of the bureaucratic ladder is the Foreign Secretary, who advises the government on all matters of external affairs.
Posting decisions — which country, what kind of mission, what level of responsibility — are made administratively within the Ministry. No formal rules today exclude women from any category of posting. But the historical pattern of which officers have been sent where, and which postings have been treated as prerequisites for senior appointments, tells a different story in practice.
Performance
On the surface, India’s IFS looks increasingly gender-diverse. Ministry of External Affairs data placed before Parliament in December 2025 shows 263 women among 954 total IFS officers — approximately 27.6 percent (Indian Masterminds, 2025). The share of women in annual recruitment intakes has grown from 31.2 percent in 2014 to 37.8 percent in 2022, with several years in between touching or crossing 40 percent (ThePrint, 2025).
Research from the UN and independent policy institutes consistently shows that peace agreements reached with women at the table tend to be more inclusive and more durable. In other words, underrepresentation in diplomacy is not merely unfair — it is costly.
Functioning
The Indian Foreign Service is India’s premier diplomatic cadre, responsible for staffing embassies, high commissions, and consulates across the world, as well as key roles within the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi. Entry is through the UPSC Civil Services Examination — one of the most demanding competitive exams in the country.
After selection, IFS officers undergo structured training at the Foreign Service Institute before being assigned their first posting. From there, careers move through a defined hierarchy — third secretary, second secretary, first secretary, counsellor, minister — before reaching the senior levels of Deputy Chief of Mission and eventually Ambassador or High Commissioner. The apex of the bureaucratic ladder is the Foreign Secretary, who advises the government on all matters of external affairs.
Posting decisions — which country, what kind of mission, what level of responsibility — are made administratively within the Ministry. No formal rules today exclude women from any category of posting. But the historical pattern of which officers have been sent where, and which postings have been treated as prerequisites for senior appointments, tells a different story in practice.
Performance
On the surface, India’s IFS looks increasingly gender-diverse. Ministry of External Affairs data placed before Parliament in December 2025 shows 263 women among 954 total IFS officers — approximately 27.6 percent (Indian Masterminds, 2025). The share of women in annual recruitment intakes has grown from 31.2 percent in 2014 to 37.8 percent in 2022, with several years in between touching or crossing 40 percent (ThePrint, 2025).
More women are clearing the exam. Fewer are sitting in the ambassador’s chair. That is the real story.
In 2020, with women at 21.6 percent of the cadre, 19 women were serving as heads of mission abroad — Ambassadors, High Commissioners, or Permanent Representatives. By December 2025, women’s share of the cadre had risen to 27.6 percent. Yet the number of women heading missions had dropped to just 11 (ThePrint, 2025).
The pipeline is more diverse. The leadership is less so. That is not stagnation — it is regression at the top, even while the base grows.
India does have genuine milestones to point to. C.B. Muthamma became the country’s first woman IFS officer in 1949 (The Diplomat, 2020) only to spend three decades fighting institutional rules that treated women as second-class officers — including having to go to the Supreme Court in 1979 to challenge a rule requiring women to seek permission before marrying.
Three women have since risen to the post of Foreign Secretary: Chokila Iyer in 2001, Nirupama Rao in 2009, and Sujatha Singh from 2013 to 2015. In 2022, Ruchira Kamboj made history as India’s first woman Permanent Representative to the United Nations, and in December that year became the first Indian woman to preside over the UN Security Council (Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, 2022).
These are real firsts. But Sujatha Singh’s tenure ended more than eleven years ago, with no woman appointed Foreign Secretary since. Ruchira Kamboj’s landmark role has not yet been succeeded by another woman. The pattern — a breakthrough, then a long silence, then perhaps another breakthrough — keeps repeating itself.
Impact
The underrepresentation of women in India’s senior diplomatic ranks has consequences that go beyond symbolism.
Foreign policy is made by people, and who those people are shapes what they see, what they prioritise, and whose concerns they centre. In conflict negotiations, climate discussions, and humanitarian responses, diverse teams tend to produce more comprehensive outcomes. When senior leadership is overwhelmingly male, the institutional knowledge, perspective, and professional networks of women diplomats get under-utilised — even when those women are doing distinguished work at lower levels.
India is actively building its case for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, positioning itself as a leading voice of the Global South, and taking on more prominent roles in multilateral bodies. Part of that credibility rests on India’s identity as a diverse, representative democracy. A Foreign Service where fewer than 11 women lead missions out of roughly 200 worldwide is a harder case to make.
There is also a simple question of what it signals to the next generation. Young women who compete for and secure one of the most prestigious services in India deserve to see a realistic path to its highest ranks — not a pattern of exceptions.
Emerging Issues
A closer look reveals several structural problems that are not getting enough attention:
•The invisible posting bias: Postings to major capitals, multilateral centres like New York and Geneva, and conflict-affected regions have historically functioned as informal credentials for ambassadorial appointments. If women officers are — formally or informally — steered toward “safer” or lower-profile postings, the consequences surface years later in who gets considered for leadership roles. This dynamic is hard to track because the MEA does not publish posting data broken down by gender.
•The missing middle-layer data: India publishes total cadre numbers by gender, but nothing about how women are distributed across seniority grades. Without knowing whether the drop-off happens at the Joint Secretary level, the Additional Secretary level, or in posting decisions, designing any targeted intervention is nearly impossible. The data gap is itself a governance failure.
•The “firsts” trap: When the same senior roles keep requiring a “first woman” label, it signals that the institution is celebrating exceptions rather than building a norm. The goal should be for these appointments to be unremarkable.
•Informal networks substituting for institutional support: Multiple senior women diplomats have spoken publicly about how informal mentorship and sponsorship shaped their careers (The print, 2025). This means access to guidance has depended heavily on personal connections rather than institutional structures — putting women who lack those networks at a disadvantage from early on.
Way Forward
The IFS does not need to wait for generational change to shift these trends. Deliberate, targeted steps can make a difference:
Publish granular representation data.
The MEA should move beyond overall cadre percentages and start publishing annual breakdowns of women’s representation at each seniority level and posting category. Accountability requires visibility.
Audit posting patterns.
An internal or independent review of how high-profile and hardship postings have been allocated over the past decade — disaggregated by gender — would reveal whether informal biases are shaping the pipeline. If they are, corrective policies can be designed with evidence rather than assumption.
Formalise mentorship within the IFS.
A structured mentorship programme connecting junior women officers with senior women diplomats would institutionalise the guidance that has historically been available only through informal networks. This is not a radical intervention — it is standard practice in many peer foreign services.
Set transparent leadership targets.
A publicly stated benchmark for women as heads of mission — with a timeline and annual public reporting — would create institutional pressure to match stated commitments with actual appointments.
India’s diplomatic record has room for pride — three women Foreign Secretaries, a landmark UN Security Council presidency. But it also has room for honesty: those milestones have not yet become the beginning of a trend. Turning them into one is the work that remains.
Conclusion
The International Day of Women in Diplomacy should be more than a date on the calendar. India’s Foreign Service has made real progress in who it recruits, and has produced genuine breakthroughs — three women Foreign Secretaries, a first woman UN envoy who presided over the Security Council. But the recent fall in the number of women heading missions, even as the cadre grows more female, suggests these breakthroughs remain exceptions rather than a settled trend.
The gap between entry and leadership is not accidental. It reflects structural realities — posting patterns that penalise caregiving, informal networks that favour continuity over inclusion, and an institutional culture that has not yet caught up with the demographic shift at its base. Symbolic firsts matter, but they cannot substitute for systemic change.
What India needs now is not celebration but accountability. Transparent data on women’s representation at every level of the IFS — not just recruitment figures, but postings, promotions, and leadership roles — must be made publicly available. Mentorship structures, flexible posting policies, and spousal employment support are not concessions; they are retention tools for a service that has already invested in training these officers.
India speaks often of the Global South and of inclusive multilateralism. That credibility is harder to maintain when its own diplomatic corps leaves talent underutilised. Getting more women through the door was the first step. Making sure they reach the top of the building and that the building itself changes to make that possible that is the work that remains.
References
Indian Masterminds. (2025). IFS cadre strength at 954: 263 women diplomats, govt tells Parliament.
https://indianmasterminds.com/news/ifs-cadre-strength-sc-st-women-diplomats-167829
Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India. (n.d.).
Official website. https://www.mea.gov.in
Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India. (2022, June 21).
Ms. Ruchira Kamboj appointed as the next Ambassador/Permanent Representative of India to the United Nations at New York.
The Diplomat. (2020, November).
Where are the women in Indian diplomacy?
https://thediplomat.com/2020/11/where-are-the-women-in-indian-diplomacy
ThePrint. (2025). Meet the women ambassadors posted in Delhi, a tight-knit and growing community.
ThePrint. (2025). Women recruits in IFS up by 6.6% from 2014–2022, but top posts largely out of reach.
United Nations. (2022, June 27). Declaring 24 June International Day of Women in Diplomacy (GA/12427).
https://press.un.org/en/2022/ga12427.doc.htm
United Nations. (2025). International Day of Women in Diplomacy.
https://www.un.org/en/observances/women-in-diplomacy-day
UN Women. (2019). Preventing conflict, transforming justice, securing the peace: A global study on the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1325. UN Women.
About the Contributor
Rakhi Kumari is a Research & Editorial Intern at IMPRI. She is currently pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Annada College, Hazaribagh (affiliated with Vinoba Bhave University, Jharkhand). Her research interests include Diplomacy, International Relations, Public Policy, Geopolitics, Sustainable Development, Energy Security, and the global trade dynamics of coal and natural gas, with a particular focus on South Asia.
Acknowledgement
The author sincerely thanks Ameya Sushilchandra Satam, Lubina Dua, and the IMPRI team for their constructive comments and editorial guidance during the review of this policy update.
Disclaimer: All views expressed in the article belong solely to the author and not necessarily to the organisation.
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