New Delhi: India Foundation is stepping beyond its usual foreign policy conclaves to launch the School of Global Leadership. This one-year, practice-focused postgraduate programme is being launched on the think tank’s 15th anniversary.
Through the programme, the think tank aims to train foreign policy enthusiasts and prepare the future generation of global leaders. The foundation sees the course as an immersion tour through the global policy ecosystem. And a young, UGC-recognised private university in Andhra Pradesh, B.E.S.T Innovation University (BESTIU), is joining this effort.
“SoGL [School of Global Leadership] is envisioned to be a state-of-the-art institution and represents a significant milestone in our commitment to promote strategic thinking, innovation in governance and effective leadership in navigating the complexities of the 21st century,” read the press release by the foundation.
Instead of conventional seminars and coursework, SoGL focuses on practical training taught by practitioners, not professors.
The school will open on 16 December 2025 at ITC Maurya in New Delhi, with Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan expected to inaugurate it.
The school’s governance comes from the foundation’s existing network. Jayant Sinha is the chair, and former diplomats Gautam Bambawale and Jaideep Mazumdar are the co-chairs. A mentor board of retired generals, ambassadors, regulators, and university heads adds more value to the project.
India Foundation was established in 2010 by Shaurya Doval. Ram Madhav, former National General Secretary, BJP, is a founding member and president of the organisation. It was set up as a policy think tank focused on governance, security, and India’s role in the world.
Its board of trustees features prominent names such as Surya Prakash, former chair of Prasar Bharti, Sunaina Singh, former Vice Chancellor of Nalanda University, and Chandra Wadhwa, former president of the Indian Council of World Affairs (ICWA).
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Studying diplomacy from ground zero
The programme will take students to 12 locations across four continents so they can understand diplomacy from ground zero. This setup is similar to other global leadership programmes.
In this endeavour, the foundation has partnered with the Hoover Institution at Stanford, the Institution of World Politics in Washington, Luiss Research Centre in Italy, the UN University in Brussels, Leiden University in the Netherlands, and the Mohammed bin Rashid School of Government in Dubai.
India Foundation is turning the foreign policy conversations it usually hosts into a paid, semi-academic course. And the tie-up gives BESTIU an international affairs programme, a new addition for the university, which was founded in 2019.
(Edited by Prasanna Bachchhav)