Sanjeev Sanyal

Sanjeev Sanyal is currently a Member of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Economic Advisory Council (since 2022) with the rank of Secretary, Government of India. He is also the Chancellor of Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune. He was earlier the Principal Economic Adviser to the Finance Minister for five years till February 2022. He has also represented India on many international forums such as OECD and G7, and served as Co-Chair of the G20’s Framework Working Group. 

Since joining the government in early 2017, he was involved in many key reforms ranging from the banking sector clean-up (2017-2020), the liberalization of several new sectors (such as drones & geo-spatial mapping), and numerous administrative process reforms. He was also part of the core team that managed the Indian economy through the Covid pandemic (2020-2022). For his contributions to public service, Sanjeev Sanyal was given the KPS Menon Memorial Award for 2023. The award is named after India’s first foreign secretary. 

Prior to joining the government, he spent over two decades in international financial markets, and served as Chief Economist for South & South-East Asia, and later as Global Strategist and a Managing Director at Deutsche Bank, Europe’s largest bank. 

 After earning a bachelor’s degree in economics from Shri Ram College of Commerce, Delhi University, Mr. Sanyal later attended Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar. In 2010 he was named as Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in Davos. He has been a visiting professor/fellow of numerous institutions such as Oxford University, Royal Geographical Society (London), Institute of Policy Studies (Singapore), Jawaharlal Nehru University (Delhi). He also chairs the board of advisors of the Delhi School of Public Policy and Governance (Delhi University). 

Mr. Sanyal has long had a keen interest in urban design. He was awarded the Eisenhower Fellowship in 2007 for his work on urban systems. In 2015-16, he served as a member of the Future City Sub-Committee of the Singapore government chaired by Lawrence Wong (now Prime Minster), and later was a member of the Board of Advisors of the World Cities Summit, Singapore. 

As one of most successful Indian writers of his generation, Mr. Sanyal has published a number of best-selling books including Revolutionaries, Land of the Seven Rivers, The Ocean of Churn, India in the Age of Ideas, Iconic Indians, The Incredible History of the Indian Ocean, Life Over Two Beers and the Indian Renaissance. He has also published around three hundred articles and columns in leading national and international publications. His writings have received many awards including the Kalinga Book Award 2023, the Art Karat Award 2018, Skoch Award for Economics 2023 and so on. His book Revolutionaries is being converted to an Amazon Prime series directed by Nikkhil Advani – the first season is slated to be released in September 2026. 

Mr. Sanyal is also a pioneer in the field of experimental archaeology. He designed and oversaw the building of INSV Kaundinya, a reconstruction of a 5th century Indian ship using the ancient “stitched” technique. He was part of the Indian Navy crew that sailed the ship from Porbandar (Gujarat) to Muscat (Oman) between 29th December 2025 and 14th January 2026. The voyage proved the trans-oceanic capability of ancient Indian ship building technology. The maiden voyage was widely covered in national and international media as an iconic expedition; Prime Minister Modi personally commended the effort.