The Club was honoured by a visit from Mr Ramesh Chander Consul General of India. Mr Chander a career diplomat who has served his country around the world in such diverse places as Prague, Tokyo, Sri Lanka and now Edinburgh gave a fascinating talk on his native India and its relations with Scotland as well as its emerging place in the world.

Commenting on the visit Club Secretary Frank Clark said “Mr Chander spoke warmly about the shared history and the strong bonds which existed between his country and ours. He emphasised the excellent economic and commercial relationships which we enjoyed and paid tribute to Scotland’s educational system which his countrymen had been privileged to benefit from over many years. The sheer scale of India was graphically demonstrated when he commented on a population of over one billion people in the worlds largest democracy with an immense cultural diversity working hard to consolidate both its national identity and its self sufficiency. In many respects it was clear that in his words this fast growing economy “had arrived”. His obvious pride in his country and its achievements (including India’s space mission to the Moon) was balanced by a refreshing honesty when he described the continuing work which was taking place on improvements to the infrastructure and the alleviation of poverty.

He was remarkably well informed about Rotary and he drew parallels between the motto of the Rotary movement “Service Above Self” and the traditions which India stood for. There were no fewer than 98,000 Rotarians in India in a total of 2,800 clubs and Rotary as an organisation continued to grow".