A new programme, Students and MEA Engagement Programme (SAMEEP), has been launched by the Indian foreign office, as part of its ‘outreach’ mission, to take Indian foreign policy and its global engagements to students across the country. The objective is to familiarise school and college students in India about the functioning of the MEA, as well as introducing them to the key elements of India’s foreign policy and its success stories by engaging with the youth at the grassroots level.
The project will require officers of Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on leave to travel to their hometowns and particularly their alma mater. They are to engage students in the schools and colleges in the jobs that the ministry is engaged in, so as to give them a fair idea of how India engages with the world, what are its foreign policy priorities and how diplomacy is actually conducted. The programme is voluntary and gives officials the option of going back to their alma mater or to any school or college in their hometown.
The ministry would give them a standardised presentation and officials would be free to improvise and add their personal experiences. The idea is not only to get the ordinary student to take an interest in India’s place in the world and its global ambitions but also to look at diplomacy as a career option. A similar programme has had IAS officers also going back to the place of their first posting to assess its development and make recommendations.
The MEA programme has crowd-sourced its name from the My Gov portal, out of 550 entries.
MEA has also started an interactive program on social media called ‘Ask the spokesperson to answer questions from people on aspects of Indian foreign policy.