About Gurcharan Das

Gurcharan Das is one of India’s foremost authors and public intellectuals. He graduated in philosophy with honors from Harvard University and was awarded Phi Beta Kappa for 'high attainments in liberal scholarship'. After a successful business career – as CEO, Procter & Gamble India and Managing Director, Procter & Gamble Worldwide (Strategic Planning) – he retired at age 50 to pursue a literary career. As a writer, he went on to shape global understanding of India’s rise and its civilizational inheritance. Through books, plays, and widely read newspaper columns, he influenced public discourse relating to India's growth story. The cornerstone of his literary contribution is a monumental quartet on the four classical Indian aims of life, which he uniquely interprets as a timeless ideal of human flourishing for the contemporary world. His masterwork, India Unbound, addressed the aim of artha (material well-being). It was the first book to predict India's economic rise following historic 1991 reforms, providing an anxious nation with a confident narrative of aspiration. Celebrated internationally --  The Guardian termed it "a quiet earthquake"; Washington Post said it was an "eye-opener"; the New York Times wrote, "something tremendous is happening in India and Das has his finger on the pulse of the transformation," and Amartya Sen, the Nobel prize winner, called it a "wonderful book."