President Droupadi Murmu and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday condoled the death of Bibek Debroy, a key economic advisor to the Prime Minister. Debroy was 69 years old. Debroy, who had a history of diabetes, hypertension and heart blockages for which he had a pacemaker, was admitted to the AIIMS emergency room late on October 31 and died around seven o’clock on Friday morning.

“He was admitted to the hospital due to subacute intestinal obstruction. He also suffered from hypertension and diabetes,” said an official source from AIIMS in Delhi. Prime Minister Modi described Debroy as “an eminent scholar, knowledgeable in various fields such as economics, history, culture, politics, spirituality and more”.

“Through his work, he left an indelible mark on India’s intellectual landscape. Beyond his contributions to public policy, he enjoyed working on our ancient texts and making them accessible to the youth,” Modi said in his condolence message on social media. he said.

“I have known Dr. Debroy for many years. I will fondly remember his insights and passion for academic discourse. I am deeply saddened by his passing. My condolences to his family and friends. Om Shanti.”

President Murmu said with Debroy’s death, the country has lost an outstanding public intellectual who enriched various fields from politics to translation of great sacred texts.

“His understanding of India’s social, cultural and economic landscape was extraordinary. He was honored with the Padma Shri for his outstanding contributions. I extend my condolences to his family, friends and fans,” the President said in a social media post.

Debroy, an empirical economist and Padma Shri award winner, had been chairman of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council since September 2017.

The man, who worked as a columnist for many newspapers, was supposed to send an article to a national daily newspaper four days before his death, with the following note: “Unusual Article. More than an elegy.”

In his yet-to-be-published essay, he wrote about his life after coming out of the cardiac care center (CCU) at AIIMS about a month ago.

“There’s a world out there. What if I’m not there? What really?” he wrote, according to an article published on the newspaper’s website on Friday.

“A few condolences, maybe even from dignitaries. ‘Irreparable loss’. Maybe a posthumous Padma Bhushan or Padma Vibhushan. A few obituaries,” he wrote.

A prolific writer, Debroy authored and edited many books, including translations of the puranas, the four vedas, and the 11 major Upanishads.

Educated at Ramakrishna Mission School, Narendrapur and Calcutta Presidency College, he attended Delhi School of Economics and Trinity College, Cambridge.

He worked on trade issues in the 1980s and law reform in the following decade. He was also a full-time member of NITI Aayog from its inception in 2015 to June 2019. His works included the authorship and editing of several books, including the puranas, the four vedas, and the 11 major Upanishads, as well as translations of the Valmiki Ramayana and Mahabharata. . Debroy was awarded the Padma Shri award in 2015.

India’s G20 Sherpa and former CEO of NITI Aayog Amitabh Kant said the country had lost one of its “brightest minds”, while Congress leader Jairam Ramesh described Debroy as “a man of unorthodox wide-ranging interests” and ” described him as having the ability to be “sane”. exhibition”.

Sanjeev Sanyal, a member of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Committee, said he had lost “a friend and mentor”. Debroy had studied at Presidency College in Calcutta; Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune; Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, Delhi; and also served as Director of the Ministry of Finance/UNDP project on legal reforms.

He has been the author/editor of several books, articles, and popular articles, and has also served as a consulting/contributing editor to various newspapers. In September, Debroy resigned as chancellor of the Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics (GIPE) after the Bombay High Court granted interim relief to the previously suspended Vice-Chancellor Ajit Ranade. In July, he was appointed rector of GIPE, which is considered a university.