Mani Shankar Aiyar

Former government minister and member of the Indian National Congress

Mani Shankar Aiyar completed his B.A. in Economics from St. Stephen's and M.A. in Economics from Trinity Hall, Cambridge, where he was an active member of the Marxist Society. He served for 26 years in the IFS, the last five of which were on deputation to the Prime Minister's Office under Rajiv Gandh Gandhi (1985-1989). He resigned from service in 1989 to take up a career in politics and the media, entering Parliament as a Congress MP from the state of Tamil Nadu in 1991. He led an unsuccessful campaign in 1996, but was re-elected in 1999.

Aiyar is a special invitee to the Congress Working Committee and chairman of both the party's political training department and the department of policy planning and coordination. A well-known political columnist, he has also written several books, including Pakistan Papers and Remembering Rajiv, and he was the editor of a four-volume publication, Rajiv Gandhi's India.