With a distinctive hairstyle likened to a massive ball of wool, economics professor Meghnad Desai was made a Labour life peer as Baron Desai, of St Clement Danes in the City of Westminster, in April 1991.

He quickly became an outspoken member of the Upper Chamber, attacking Gordon Brown's last budget in 2007 for creating a "fiendishly complicated" system of tax credits, and accusing Tony Blair of failing to read the mood of the Labour party over his resignation date.

A strong supporter of the right for people to choose when to die, he criticised bishops who opposed a 2006 bill on the subject. "Religion relies on fear," he said. "I have no fear of God or the afterlife. I value my life for the pleasure it gives me and I have always liked this Bill because it gives me autonomy."

Lord Desai also knows how to have fun. He once abandoned the dispatch box to sing a Bollywood song at Parliament's annual variety show.

Emeritus professor of economics at the London School of Economics and a leading member of the Asian community in the UK, Lord Desai is also a former member of John Smith's shadow cabinet and long-term party activist in London.

He was born on July 10, 1940, in Baroda India, with four siblings, two brothers and two sisters. His father, a government official, was “never satisfied with him”, according to Desai, despite his gaining a master’s degree in economics before he was 20 years old.

In 1960, Desai won a scholarship to Pennsylvania University. After completing his PhD before he was 22, he moved to London to serve as an intern at the London School of Economics, getting a job there in 1965. Since then he has become one of the UK's most respected economic commentators.

A Chairman of the National Secular Society, the academic says his only regret in life was not being as good looking as Dilip Kumar, the legendary Bollywood actor whom he later wrote a book about. While researching the book Desai met Kishwar Ahluwalia, his second wife. They married on July 20, 2004.

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