Subramanian Swamy is an Indian politician, economist and statistician. Before joining politics, he was a professor of Mathematical Economics at the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. He is known for his Hindu nationalist views. Swamy was a member of the Planning Commission of India and was a Cabinet Minister in the Chandra Shekhar government. Between 1994 and 1996, Swamy was Chairman of the Commission on Labour Standards and International Trade under former Prime Minister P. V. Narasimha Rao. Swamy was a long-time member of the Janata Party, serving as its president until 2013 when he joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He has written on foreign affairs of India dealing largely with China, Pakistan and Israel. He was nominated to Rajya Sabha on 26 April 2016 for a 6 year term, ending on 24 April 2022.

Family and education

Subramanian Swamy was born on 15 September 1939, in Mylapore, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, to a family which hailed originally from Madurai in Tamil Nadu in a Tamil Brahmin family. His father, Sitaraman Subramanian, was a bureaucrat and his mother, Padmavathi, was a homemaker. He has one younger brother, Ram Subramanian, as well as two younger sisters.

Sitaraman Subramanian was an officer in the Indian Statistical Service who served as the director of the Central Statistical Institute in Delhi, and was a statistical adviser to the Government of India. The family, which hailed from Madurai in Tamil Nadu, moved to New Delhi when Swamy was only six months old. Due to his father's job and the family's Tamil roots, major national leaders like K. Kamaraj, C. Rajagopalachari and S. Satyamurti often visited Sitaraman.

Education

He attended Hindu College, University of Delhi, from where he earned his bachelor's degree in Mathematics. He then took his master's degree in Statistics from the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata. He was later recommended by Hendrik S. Houthakker and went to study at Harvard University on a full Rockefeller scholarship, where he received his PhD in Economics in 1965, with his thesis titled Economic Growth and Income Distribution in a Developing Nation. His thesis adviser was Nobel laureate Simon Kuznets. While he was a doctoral student at Harvard, he attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a cross-registered student and later worked at the United Nations Secretariat in New York City as an Assistant Economics Affairs Officer in 1963. He subsequently worked as a resident tutor at Lowell House at Harvard University.

Family and personal life

Swamy met Roxna Kapadia, whose father was member of Indian Civil Service (British India) and an Indian lady of Parsi ethnicity who was studying PhD in mathematics at Harvard University. They were married in June 1966. Swamy has two daughters. The elder daughter, Gitanjali Swamy, is an entrepreneur and private equity professional. She is married to Sanjay Sarma, a professor at MIT, who is the son of E.A.S Sarma, a retired IAS officer and former secretary of Economic Affairs to the government of India. The younger daughter, Suhasini Haidar, is a print and television journalist married to Nadeem Haidar, the son of former Indian Foreign Secretary Salman Haidar.

Academic career

In July 1965, immediately after obtaining his PhD in economics from Harvard, Swamy joined the Department of Economics at the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences as an assistant professor. in 1969, he was made an associate professor. As an associate professor, he was invited by Amartya Sen to occupy the chair on Chinese studies at the Delhi School of Economics. He accepted the offer and even travelled to India to take up the position, but his appointment was cancelled at the last minute due to his views on India's economic policy and also its nuclear policy. at that time, India was still partially oriented towards socialism and the "command economy" model instituted by Nehru, and Swamy was a believer in market economy.

Political career

Early politics

Swamy's career started with his involvement in the Sarvodaya movement, which was an apolitical movement but which formed the foundation of the creation of Janata Party later. The real turn in his political career came after his sacking from IIT. Liberal economic policies put forward by him did not go well with the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi who sneered at his plans as 'Santa Claus with unrealistic ideas'. He was later expelled from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi. This marked the beginning of his active political career. As a staunch opponent of Indira Gandhi, the opposition part, Bharatiya Jana Sangh sent him to Rajya Sabha – the upper house of Indian Parliament.

He was an elected Member of Lok sabha, the lowe house of Indian Parliament five times between 1974 and 1999. As a Lok Sabha member, he represented the city of Mumbai North East twice (1977 and 1980) and later the city of Madurai (1998). As a Rajya Sabha member, herepresented Uttar Pradesh (1974) in the Parliament.

During Emergency (1975-1977)

During the period of the Emergency, he fled to the United States, seeking haven with an Indian businessman in Michigan who had become the spokesperson of the opposition in the United States. In 1976, when the Emergency was still in force and an arrest warrant had been issued in his name, Swamy came to Parliament to attend the session and managed to escape India after the session was adjourned. This act of defiance was well received in the eyes of opposition parties.

In Janata Party

In 1981, he along with Harish Rawat and 13 others led first pilgrimage to Kailash–Manasarovar after 1962 Sino-Indian War. In 1984, Swamy stated his opinion that Janata Party should focus on organisational levels of the party. In February 1984, he filed his nomination for Janata Party President against Chandra Shekhar, but lost. In the same year, 1984, Swamy was expelled from Janata Party after he levelled allegations against Chandra Shekhar that Shekhar had manipulated the Janata Party presidency election. Subsequently, he joined Lok Dal, party of former Prime Minister Charan Singh. He fought 1984 Lok Sabha election from Mumbai North East Lok Sabha constituency on Lok Dal ticket, but lost.

In May 1988, Lok Dal (A) was merged with Janata Party with Ajit Singh as its president and Swamy became general secretary of Janata Party. Later in October 1988, Janata Dal was formed by merging major opposition parties with Janata Party one of its constituent. But Swamy along with Indubhai Patel, H. D. Deve Gowda, Syed Shahabuddin, Sarojini Mahishi refused to accept the merger of Janata Party into Janata Dal and remained in Janata Party. In December 1990, he was elected as president of Janata Party by Central Parliamentary Board.

Minister of commerce and Law of India (1990-1991)

During 1990 and 1991, Swamy served as a member of the Planning Commission of India and as Cabinet Minister of Commerce and Law. On 27 December 1990, Financial Times published an interview of Swamy by David Housego in which he claimed that the decision to raise import duties by his government is a "panic reaction". In Parliament Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar claimed that Swamy had denied what had been attributed to him in the article, but David Housego who wrote the story stood firmly by it.

Honours and awards

Books, Research papers and journals

Swamy is the author of several books, research papers and journals. a complete list of papers, books and journals authored by him is given below. He has also co-authored with Paul Samuelson, a paper on the Theory of Index Numbers (American Economic Review, 1974) and another in the Royal Economic Society's Economic Journal (1984).