Mr Sanjay PANDA
Ambassador at Republic of India to the Republic of TurkeyAmbassador Sanjay Panda, 58, is a career diplomat and a member of the Indian Foreign Service (IFS). He took over his new assignment as the Ambassador-designate of India to the Republic of Turkey on 12 June 2020. He moved to Ankara from the United States, where he held the post of the Consul General of India in San Francisco since November 2018.
Sanjay Panda joined the IFS in 1991. He has served at the Indian missions in Brussels (Belgium) during 1993-94; Amman (Jordan) during 1994-1998, Paris (France) during 2001-2004 and Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) during 2004-2008. He was the Deputy Chief of Mission in Tokyo (Japan) from 2010 to 2014 before assuming charge as the Indian High Commissioner to Seychelles in August 2014, his first assignment as Head of Mission. He returned to New Delhi in November 2016 to take over as Joint Secretary (Indian Ocean Region) in the Ministry of External Affairs, a post which he held till November 2018 before moving to San Francisco. His previous assignment at headquarters was as Joint Secretary (East Asia)-II at the Ministry of External Affairs. He has also served as Under Secretary/Deputy Secretary for Nepal at the Foreign Ministry during 1998-2000, and as Director (China) during 2008-2009. He speaks French and several Indian languages.
He is a postgraduate in Political Science and International Relations from the University of Delhi (1983).
His professional experience includes working in the private sector as a Management Trainee in Advertising with the Shriram Group in New Delhi. After a two-year stint in the corporate world, he moved over to the public sector joining the state-owned Oriental Insurance Company as Administrative Officer. In 1987, he qualified for the Indian Civil Services and joined the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting in New Delhi as Information Officer to the Government of India, before joining the Indian Foreign Service.
Sanjay Panda was born at Cuttack in the State of Odisha. He is married to Minati and they have two sons.