Mahalanobis International Award

The Mahalanobis International Award is sponsored by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation of the Government of India. The award recognizes an individual for lifetime achievements in statistics in a low and middle income country or region. It is expected that the award will have the potential to attract, inspire and motivate statisticians across the developing world to increase the quantity and improve the quality of their contributions to the cause of promotion and development of statistics and its applications. The award is presented biennially during the ISI World Statistics Congress.

This initiative by the Government of India serves the dual purpose of honouring Professor P. C. Mahalanobis for his lifetime contributions and achievements in Statistics, and recognising and stimulating progress in Statistics in low and middle income countries/regions.

The achievements of the candidate will be considered under three main criteria and reflecting the spirit of Mahalanobis’s lifetime work:

• Academic leadership for low and middle income countries/regions;
• Professional and official leadership for low and middle income countries/regions and
• Inspiration and capacity-building within low and middle income countries/regions.

Some examples of contributions are:

• Innovative and concrete contributions to some field of application such as agriculture, economic development, education, health, industry, etc.;
• Statistical capacity building at a national or regional level;
• Improvements of national or regional statistical systems and/or infrastructure;
• Enrichment of statistical methodology

Professor P.C. Mahalanobis

P.C. Mahalanobis (1893-1972) was a highly distinguished statistician who made extensive contributions to methodology, applications, statistical development, and public policy.

He founded the Indian Statistical Institute and served as an advisor to the Government of India.