Dr. Subramanian Swamy is the former Union Minister of Commerce and Industry & Law and Justice under Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar. He is currently a nominated Member of Parliament of the Rajya Sabha. He has also served as a member of the Planning Commission of India. Dr. Swamy is responsible for simplifying trade procedures and formulating a new export strategy which was the forerunner of trade reform adopted subsequently.
Dr. Swamy was born in Mylapore, Chennai and is the eldest of 4 siblings, 1 younger brother, and 2 younger sisters. Dr. Swamy attended the Hindu College, University of Delhi, where he earned his Bachelors Honours in Mathematics. He then took his Masters Degree in Statistics from the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata. He went on to complete his Doctorate in Economics from Harvard University on a full scholarship where he was also a student at the reputed Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as a cross-registered student.
Due to his opposing views to the Nehru ideology of Command Economy and Indias orientation to Socialism, his appointment to the Chair of Chinese Studies at the Delhi School of Economics was canceled at the last minute, he moved to the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi and was a Full Professor of Mathematical Economics from 1969 to the early 70s.
His first political position was in the Rajya Sabha representing Bharatiya Jana Sangh and what followed was a long and illustrious career in Politics which at its pinnacle saw him as the Union Minister of two different Ministries simultaneously. He has been elected as a Member of Parliament 5 times. He is one of the founding members of the Janata Party and served as its president till 2013.