About Prakash Karat

Prakash Karat was born in Rangoon, Burma on February 7, 1948. His father worked with the British Railways. The Karats are Nairs from Elappully, Kerala. Prakash Karat lost his father while still in school and moved to Madras with his mother Radha and sister Kamala. The sister died in her teens and the mother took up a job as an LIC (Life Insurance Corporation of India) agent. Karat was educated at the Madras Christian College as an undergraduate student of Economics,where he won the prize for the best all round achievement and was a resident of St.Thomas\s Hall. He graduated with a gold medal and won a scholarship to Britain’s University of Edinburgh, for a Masters’ degree in politics. It was at Edinburgh that he met with Professor Victor Kiernan, the famed Marxist and became a strident communist. His political activism began with anti-apartheid protests at the University, for which he