Biography:
Prof. Anurag Kumar, an eminent Indian academic and electrical engineer, is renowned for his contributions to communication networks, distributed systems, and optimization.

Educational Background:
• B.Tech (1977) in Electrical Engineering from IIT Kanpur, where he was awarded the President's Gold Medal.
• Ph.D. (1981) in Electrical Engineering from Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, U.S.A. Major area: Information and Decision Sciences; Minor area: Operations Research and Mathematics

Career:
• Teaching Assistant and Graduate Research Assistant, School of Electrical Engineering at Cornell University (September 1977 – December 1981)
• Visiting Research Student, Information Systems Laboratory, Department of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University (July 1979 – June 1980)
• Prof. Kumar began his professional career as a Member of Technical Staff at AT&T Bell Laboratories from 1981 to 1988.
• Afterward, he returned to India and joined the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical Communication Engineering (ECE) (June 1988 – September 1991) and got promoted to Associate Professor (October 1991 – September 1997).
• He became Professor in 1996 and later served as the Director of IISc from 2014 to 2020.
• After his superannuation, he was appointed as an Honorary Professor at IISc in 2020.
• Since January 1, 2024, he has been serving as an Indian National Science Academy (INSA) Distinguished Professor.

Prof. Kumar has published about 200 peer-reviewed papers in journals and conferences, focusing on performance analysis, optimization, and control of communication networks and distributed systems. His research contributions have significantly advanced the understanding and improvement of telecommunication networks, particularly in mathematical modeling and optimization.

Contributions to Indian Telecommunications:
Prof. Kumar returned to India during a time when the telecommunications revolution was taking shape, and the internet was in its early stages. He played a pivotal role in the ERNET (Education and Research Network) project, which established India's first nationwide internet network, serving academic institutions for over a decade. He was one of the first researchers in India to apply mathematical techniques to the design and optimization of communication networks.

Prof. Kumar has been a consultant for various government and private organizations and has mentored a networking start-up from its early stages to a global scale. He has also led the authorship of two major books that are widely used internationally.

Research Area:
• Communication Networks
• Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS)
• Distributed Systems
• Stochastic Modeling and Analysis
• Optimization and Control

Awards and recognitions/ Positions held:
• 1977 President's Gold Medal at IIT Kanpur.
• IISc Alumni Award for Excellence in Engineering Research (2008).
• Elected as a Fellow of several prestigious institutions:
  • IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers)
  • Indian National Science Academy (INSA)
  • Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE)
  • Indian Academy of Sciences (IASc)
  • The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS)
• Vasvik Award for Information Technology (2015).
• IEI–IEEE Award for Engineering Excellence (2017).
• Awarded the J.C. Bose National Fellowship by the Department of Science and Technology (2011–2021).