1. I was rudely awakened one late night, by the persistent ring of my bed side phone, to learn that Joint Secretary (Administration) from the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) wanted to speak. Coming on the line, he asked rhetorically ‘if I was sleeping’ and merrily went on to convey that I had been chosen for a ‘challenging assignment’ as the first ever Consul General of India in Vladivostok. “Why me” was my instinctive reaction! This was way back in January 1992 and I had been happily asleep in my elegant 21st floor apartment in Manhattan, New York.
2. The ensuing weeks and months were a blur as we slipped into the fast-forward mode. Our friends in New York bade us a tearful goodbye convinced that we were being banished to ‘Siberia’ for some serious misdemeanor, never to be seen again. Having admitted my bewildered nine-year old son to Lawrence School, Sanawar – a boarding school near Simla – I headed off to Vladivostok accompanied only by my wife, six-year old daughter, lots of trepidation and little by way of guidance from New Delhi or Moscow. We arrived at Vladivostok Airport, on a bright sunny morning on 9 September 1992 and were greeted by the entire Indian community comprising of two and a half persons (two Indian men and a toddler from an inter-racial marriage), officials of Mayor’s office and a few journalists.
3. I distinctively remember two of the questions. One, if there was any difference between New York and Vladivostok? Surveying the scene around the typhoon hit crumbling premises of the mufassil like Vladivostok Airport, I assured the journalists that there was none, instantly earning me laudatory headlines in next day’s newspapers. The second question was ‘when the Consulate General of India (CGI) was going to be operational’? I said that the CGI stood opened with my arrival, little realizing that in the bargain, I became the first Consul General in the world, to set-up shop in Vladivostok, a hitherto closed city. The Americans established their Consulate with a vessel carrying American dignitaries sailing into Vladivostok port and due pomp and pageantry, a few days later. It took me months to dispel my esteemed US colleague’s complaint that I had stolen his thunder, even if unwittingly.
4. Nothing had prepared me for the shock that followed. It was no longer the Russia that I had left behind in 1986. Gone was the orderly life, ubiquitous presence of baton waving militia and the sense of confidence among people! There were practically no vegetables or fruit for my die-hard vegetarian wife, no English medium school for my daughter and a virtual absence of rentable accommodation. Crime was rife with the so-called mafia calling the shots. Within months of our arrival, the throat of my young Indian Personal Assistant was slashed and his newly married wife brutally assaulted, right in their apartment. They were robbed of all their jewellery and valuables. We gave the traumatized couple the choice to go back to India, but they stoically stayed on, dealing with the nightmarish experience head-on. Bravo! But I have jumped ahead of the narrative here.
5. The city Government helpfully gave us a few rooms in the city’s only hotel, the eponymously named Vladivostok, which served as our temporary residences and Chancery. Naturally, hunt for suitable Consulate premises and residential accommodation started in full earnest. After a few months, Vice-Governor Libidinits of Premorsky Krai, who later became a close friend, generously allotted us a suite in ‘Sanatornaya’, some 20kms from Vladivostok, which was constructed during the famous Ford – Brezhnev Summit in 1974. Surrounded by imposing pine trees and close to a lake, the place was picturesque indeed. It served as our residence for the next two years, while our baggage sat in storage. My colleagues at CGI also gradually managed to get apartments, thanks to the welcome mat rolled out by the Government and people of Vladivostok.
6. We were next introduced to an industrialist Mr. Kostyekov, who overtime, with his warm heart and tremendous sense of humour, became my friend, philosopher and guide. I frankly don’t know what I would have done without him. He graciously offered a wing on the first floor of his property, located very strategically near the Governorate, to serve as our Chancery. Doubling as architects and interior designers, my wife and I along with our friend and landlord, set about re-designing and renovating the place. We surprised even ourselves when we had the Chancery up and running in a record six weeks, quite an achievement during those days in Russia.
7. With a safe and warm one bedroom apartment to call home and take refuge from the bitterly cold Siberian winter (what luxury!), as well as, a fully functioning Consulate with three Indian and a similar number of Russia colleagues, we were off to the races.
8. I have always maintained that CGI, Vladivostok registered the highest ever trade growth of 12 million times. We zoomed from zero to 12 million dollars in direct trade with Pacific Russia, in one year! The first commercial deal is something that is still etched in my memory. A young Russian walked into my office without any appointment one fine morning. His weather-bitten and scarred face revealed its own story. He carried some fifteen thousand dollars in cash, which he placed on my table and sought help in importing a container of Indian tea, explaining that the stack of cash that lay before me was his life’s saving. We identified a well-known export house in Kolkata, which naturally insisted on and was given 100% advance payment. Nine weeks were to pass before the consignment arrived, during which period I led an excruciating sleepless existence. But after the first foray, made sweeter by our friend’s smiling thanks, there was indeed no looking back.
9. We went about meticulously building on our commercial ties and identified food products, garments, woolens, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, jewellery, etc. as items having ready demand in the region. Next came the task of attracting Indian companies to our out-post in Russia. I must say to their credit that quite a few Indian companies responded with enthusiasm. The early birds caught their worms when the local GUM (the biggest departmental store) placed an order worth one million dollars of merchandise on a couple of Indian exporters.
10. Within months, we started having a trickle of visitors from India. By the end of the first year, six Indian companies had set up small resident trade offices in Vladivostok. Our Indian community was now two dozen strong!
11. Meanwhile, we were also active on the social and community fronts. My wife, who was a lecturer in economics before our marriage, established good contacts with the Far-eastern State University in Vladivostok, which expressed great interest in Hindi. I can only thank Raj Kapoor (Awara Hun & Mera Nam Jokar) and Bollywood for this opening! She and the Embassy ladies started volunteering as teachers for a token salary of Ruble 1 per month. Hindi books were procured from India and gifted. Within weeks five students had eagerly enrolled.
12. The outreach didn’t stop here. By now, half a dozen foreign Consulates were functioning in Vladivostok and the consular community had begun to acquire some profile. My wife, who had also developed friendly relations with the Governor’s wife (she even visited India a year later), persuaded her to become the patron of Consular Wives’ Club. They started undertaking charitable activities at a modest scale. Indian drugs, generously donated by Torrent, were gifted to a couple of clinics and hospitals. Expenses for medical care of a few poor kids were defrayed. Education material was supplied to some schools.
13. But Vladivostok was not all work and toil. We had our fun. I recall having asked my chauffer about the giant king crabs that I saw occasionally in the market. He caught hold of a bucket and disappeared without saying a word, only to return after one hour, grinning from ear to ear, with two huge fellows floating in a bucket full of sea water. The crabs cost me a princely sum of two dollars!
14. That I was a Russian speaker helped, but not without its own hilarious moments. A bit under the weather, I once went to a local polyclinic and was shown into the cabinet of a pretty ‘English speaking’ doctor. She immediately asked me to ‘show my language’. Foxed, I looked at her helplessly till she stuck out her tongue --- and the penny dropped! The Russian word ‘yezik’ is used both for ‘language’ and ‘tongue’.
15. My big professional breakthrough, however, came in the middle of 1993 when the President of Yakutia Autonomous Republic, the biggest producer of diamond roughs in Russia agreed to receive me. I became the first Indian official to land at Yakutsk, capital of the Republic, most of which is in the perma-frost northern Siberian region (temperatures can dip below 40 degree centigrade). In a fit of generosity, the President graciously offered to give me a personal tour of the Republic’s underground vaults, containing a rather impressive collection of diamonds. I am today the proud owner of a picture of myself holding two 150 carrot stones, one in each hand. Within months of my visit, we got a Gems and Jewellery Export Promotion Council delegation to Yakutsk, which managed to sign a MOU for sourcing industrial roughs, as gem quality stones had already been committed by the Russian Government to De Beers. Russia has since emerged as an important source of high quality roughs for Indian diamond merchants.
16. I have a treasure of fond memories of my stay in Vladivostok; from the bone rattling 10 hour non-stop flights to Moscow, packed like sardines in Aeroflot of the yore, to camping on the banks of the fabled lake Baikal with Ambassador Ronen Sen. I am unlikely to forget the 5 AM sendoff banquet hosted by the Governor of Novosibirsk, at the airport VIP lounge for Ambassador and me with vodka and steak. I must confess to having refused to touch the stuff at such an ungodly hour, but Ambassador Sen, ever a diplomat, most sportingly made up for my failing. By the way, as far as I know, Russian is the only language to have a word for a shot of alcohol, to deal with a hangover called ‘pakhmilyatsya’. Over our two year stay, we travelled extensively across the Russian far-east and Eastern Siberia, proudly flying the Indian flag, mapping the region, making friends and sending detailed impressions back home.
17. We left Vladivostok with a heavy heart, exactly after two years on 9 September 1994. Vice-Governor of the Province and his graceful wife floored us by their gesture of coming personally to the airport to see us off. As the plane took off, I longingly bade farewell to the land that had shaped the diplomat in me, saying a silent thank you to the Ministry for sending me on this “challenging assignment”.
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