Nagma Mallick, an IFS Officer of 1991 batch, currently the Additional Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs has been appointed as the ambassador of India to the Republic of Poland and Lithuania. Born and brought up in Delhi but her parents trace its roots to Kasargod. Her Keralite parents are natives of Fort Road in Kasargod town. They moved to Delhi after her father Mohammad Habibullah got a job in the Overseas Communication Department.
Nagma did her bachelor’s degree from St Stephen’s College by taking a major in English and her postgraduation in Sociology from Delhi School of Economics. She can fluently speak English, French, Hindi, Urdu, and Malayalam.
In her diplomatic career, she started in Paris with the Indian Mission to UNESCO. In New Delhi, she started to work as a Desk Officer in the West Europe Division of the Ministry of External Affairs. She has also served as a staff officer to the former Prime Minister IK Gujral.
She has also served as the first secretary and counselor of India’s Missions in Nepal and Sri Lanka respectively. She looked after India’s bilateral relations with Russia and the 11 CIS countries as the director in the Eurasia Division. She was Deputy Chief of Mission in the Embassy in Thailand, from July 2010 to September 2012. She also served as India’s ambassador to Tunisia from October 2012 to November 2015, and high commissioner to Brunei Darussalam from December 2015 till December 2018. She met deputy minister of foreign affairs Marcin Przydacz on September 15 after she was appointed as the ambassador to Poland.
Her family members have a well-known background. Her father’s sister Sara Aboobacker, is a well-known Kannada writer. Their younger brother who will be Mallick’s uncle is, Lieutenant P Mohammed Hasheem and he was killed in action during the 1965 India-Pakistan war at the age of 23. A street named “The Lt Hasheem Street” in Kasaragod’s Thalangara is named after him. Puthiyapura Ahmed, Mallick’s paternal grandfather was one of the first Muslim advocates of Kasaragod, who practiced from the 1930s to 1970. While Mallick is married to Fareed Inam Mallick, a Delhi-based lawyer and they have one son and one daughter.
