An extremely distinguished diplomat and brilliant Mathematician, Ambassador Balakrishnan Shetty was Ambassador to the Kingdom of Sweden and Latvia; to the Kingdom of Bahrain and to Senegal, Cape Verde Islands, Guinea Bissau, Mali and Mauritania and High Commissioner to Gambia. He served as Minister (Economic), Embassy of India, Paris handling bilateral trade and investments with respect to France and relations with the OECD, Joint Secretary at the Foreign Service Institute, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), New Delhi in charge of the Professional Course for Foreign Diplomats, Director and subsequently Joint Secretary (Technical Co-Operation Division), MEA, Deputy High Commissioner, High Commission of India, Singapore dealing with bilateral trade, investments, media and culture, First Secretary and subsequently Counsellor (Political), Embassy of India, Moscow (June’1988 – July, 1991). He also held posts in India- as Undersecretary (Economic Division), Undersecretary (State Trading and Overseas Indian Investments) in Ministry of Commerce and as Deputy Director General (Administration), Indian Council for Cultural Relations, Delhi.
He also was posted to the Permanent Mission of India, Geneva, to High Commission of India, Dhaka, as Second Secretary (Media and Culture) and subsequently, as First Secretary(Economic and Commerce).
He is a distinguished Researcher, School of Mathematics, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai (1972- 1973) working in the field of Abstract Harmonic Analysis, and the Author of “What is Mathematics?” published by National Book Trust India, 2013
Currently, he is involved with the following :
President, Governing Body, Action for Food Production (AFPRO), N Delhi, a 50-year-old socio-technical institution declared as “Institution of National Importance“ by the Government of India, in the field of drinking water, sanitation, climate change and rural livelihood;
Mentor, Salute the Soldier LLP, N.Delhi, for assisting retired soldiers and their families;
Advisor, IWAY, Pondicherry for helping Lycee Francais de Pondichery and French citizens of Indian origin;
Advisor, Edsix Brain Labs Pvt. Ltd, IIT Madras Research Park, Chennai in the field of cognition;
Member, Governing Body, Jesus and Mary College, N Delhi;
Board Advisor, BoB eProcure Software Solutions, Bengaluru; and
Life Member, Indian Society for History of Mathematics, Dept. of Mathematics, Ramjas College, University of Delhi, Delhi;
Resource Person for Nation-wide Sensitization Programme on Mathematics for Teachers, Vigyan Prasar, Dept of Science &Technology, Govt. of India( 2013-16).
Guest Faculty, Department of Mathematics, Indraprastha Institute for Information Technology, Delhi teaching Number theory (2013-14 and 2014-15).
Diplomatic Mentor, Indian Council for World Affairs, N. Delhi after retirement from Government Service (July, 2011-December, 2012).
He is an M.Sc. (Mathematics), First Class from IIT, Kanpur with a B.Sc.Honours (Mathematics), First Class from Presidency College, Kolkata, 1970
