The National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister Ajit Doval has chosen a retired Foreign Service officer, Jayant Prasad, as the person to lead the diplomatic efforts to mollify China. It is said that Prasad, who held the position of India’s ambassador in Afghanistan, Algeria, Geneva and Nepal, has a happy relationship with the Dragon. At the moment he is director general of a strategic studies think tank in Delhi. His wife is also an IAS officer of 1976 batch. Before joining the foreign service the same year, Prasad used to teach History in Delhi’s St Stephen’s College. His father Bimal Prasad is a well-known scholar who has done voluminous research in JNU. He had close relations with former prime minister Chandra Shekhar, who had even appointed Bimal Prasad as Indian ambassador to Nepal.