Background
He is the son of Shreela Flather, Baroness Flather.
He is the son of Shreela Flather, Baroness Flather.
He was formerly a journalist working for the British Broadcasting Corporation, Times newspapers and the New Statesman where he was deputy editors He has written for many publications on education and politics. His research interests focus on Indian democracy since 1947 and more recently on anti-corruption strategies.
He worked with dissident movements in Central Europe in the 1980s and race equality groups in the United Kingdom, serving as chair of the British Organisation of People of India Origin.
He remains involved with charities, civic bodies and race bodies. He chairs the Noon Educational Foundation supporting Pakistani scholars to study at top United Kingdom universities and is on the editorial board of RoundTable journal.
He then worked for four years for the Open Society Foundation setting up a variety of international Soros programmes and was founding Secretary-General & Chief Executive Officer of the Central European University which was originally set up in Prague, Budapest and Warsaw after the 1989 revolutions. He was Director of international and external affairs at Oxford University for five years until 2000.
He took his Bachelor, Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy at Balliol College, Oxford.
He was an elected Member of the London Council in the 1980s chairing the London-wide Committee on Post-School Education and was elected to many national education bodies.