Former UN Under-Secretary-General Shashi Tharoor, a member of the Indian Parliament, has been appointed the new Minister of State for Human Resource Development. (HRD).

Speaking after the swearing-in ceremony last week, he said: “We have 545 million under the age of 25. We have got to give them a future and clearly the ministry has a lot to do with that. Even if the time span of this parliament is only a year and half, we are very confident we can make a significant contribution during the time.”

“I am very grateful to be part of the team. I am grateful for the confidence that has been placed on me. I came back to India after a long time away in order to take contribution to our country,” said Tharoor, a former Minister of State for External Affairs.

In 1996 ,Tharoor was appointed Director of Communications and Special Projects and Executive Assistant to the Secretary-General Kofi Annan. In January 2001, he was appointed Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information, and headed the Department of Public Information (UNDPI), where he presided over one of the larger Departments in the Secretariat, with some 750 staff and field offices in 63 countries.

Tharoor’s career in the United Nations began in 1978 as a staff member of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Geneva. From 1981 to 1984 he headed the UNHCR office in Singapore during the boat people crisis. In 1989 he was appointed as the Special Assistant to the Under-Secretary-General for Special Political Affairs, the unit that later became the Peacekeeping Operations in New York. Until 1996, he led the team responsible for peacekeeping operations in the former Yugoslavia.^[7]

Tharoor was the official candidate of India in the elections for UN secretary-general, and came a close second to current Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, out of seven contenders in the race.

Tharoor is the award-winning author of thirteen books, as well as hundreds of articles, op-eds and book reviews in a wide range of publications, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the International Herald Tribune, Time, Newsweek and The Times of India. He served for two years as a Contributing Editor and occasional columnist for Newsweek International.