From Manipur to Beirut: Envoy leads from front to help Indians get out of war zone

A Thadou Kuki from Churachandpur in Manipur who studied in Shillong and joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1980, Lhouvum landed in Beirut in March 2005. Batchmate and husband Gautam Mukhopadhyay is in Damascus, the Indian envoy to Syria. In fact, husband and wife coordinated the evacuation of the first lot of Indians—via road to Damascus.

“Anybody in my place would have done the same. It’s team work, don’t forget that,” says Lhouvum. It’s another matter that she has a very small team in Beirut: they are just nine, including the Embassy’s security guards.

“We have another 200 requests for evacuation pending. As of now, the process is on.” Indian warships have been carrying people to Cyprus from where they are being flown home.

Those who have worked with Lhouvum say she has done some commendable work. As Joint Secretary, South East Asia and ASEAN during the Narasimha Rao years, she actively promoted the Look East policy. Later, she played a key role in organising the first Indo-ASEAN car rally in 2004. India’s North-East, she always maintained, stood to gain from the Look East policy.

She has served as Second Secretary in the Dhaka mission and Deputy Consul General in New York. She’s also an alumni of the National Defence College.