Vettel stormed to his 10th win of the year a clear 12 seconds ahead of Lewis Hamilton, who started the 55-lap race on pole position. Vettel's teammate Mark Webber secured the final podium position. The German sealed his second drivers' title in Japan last week.
Force India, aiming for their third doubles points finish, were beaten by a faster rival team on the day - Toro Rosso - whose drivers Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Buemi came home in seventh and ninth place.
It was in fact Buemi who got past di Resta on Lap 50, snatching an extra point from the newly named Indian team. Force India' s more experienced driver Adrian Sutil finished just outside the points bracket at 11th position. Di Resta conceded that they did not have the pace to match Toro Rosso.
"It is good to come away with a point, but ultimately we didn’t have the performance to match Toro Rosso," said di Resta.
"It looked like we might be able to hold off Buemi in the final laps, but we came up six or seven laps too short with the tyres and I couldn’t hold him back. In terms of tyres, we probably should have been a bit more aggressive with the strategy and used my new supersofts at the start of the race, rather than the used set."
Force India had planned for a three-stop strategy but a safety car intervention on Lap 17 made them switch to a two-stopper.
Deputy team principal Robert Fernley said they lost the points battle against Toro Rosso towards the end of the race and vowed to perform better in the remaining three race including the Indian Grand Prix in two weeks time.
"In many ways it was a fairly straightforward race for us. We spent the whole race in a close tussle with Toro Rosso and they got the better of us in the end. They were particularly strong in the final stint and that is when Beumi was able to jump ahead of Paul," said Fernley.
"Our next stop is the team’s home race in New Delhi, which is an event that everyone in the team is looking forward to. It will be a historic race for Formula One and hopefully we can deliver a strong showing in front of the Indian fans."
Force India remain sixth in the Constructor's Championship with 49 points, ahead of Sauber on 40 and Toro Rosso on 37.