Abstract
Memories and tributes from former pupils, colleagues and friends
Ajit Singh taught at Cambridge from the mid-1960s on. He was an inspiring, supportive but demanding teacher to which several contributors’ fond memories attest. Ajit was an extremely hard worker, and his output of frequently seminal articles and books, all of which exhibited innovative theoretical approaches and most careful relevant empirical work, was prodigious. This is all the more remarkable as he had to battle with the effects of Parkinson’s disease from the early 1980s on.
We have gathered here together a number of tributes from his wide circle of friends, colleagues, and former pupils, mostly overlapping sets. The tributes between them show what a range of important issues Ajit worked on, how early he became aware of them and how perceptive his findings and often predictions proved to be.
Before I urge readers to read on, may I add a personal note? Ajit and I were close friends from 1963 onwards and colleagues for many years. I wrote in the Foreword to the 2008 volume in his honour, edited by Philip Arestis and John Eatwell, that I wished to pay a personal tribute to his kindness, support and consideration over the many years of our friendship. Ajit has never been a narrow-focused economist; he has always been well informed on and involved in the major political issues of the day (with which he combines an encyclopaedic knowledge of what is happening in world cricket). When I returned to Australia in early 1967, I was meticulously briefed by Ajit (and Martin Bernal) on the history and then present position of the Vietnam War, which stood me in good stead when I became one of the leaders of the anti-Vietnam War movement in South Australia. (Harcourt, 2008: xiii)
That volume and this collection of tributes suitably witness the achievements of the splendid scholar and admirable human being we knew Ajit to have been.