Ambassador Naresh Chandra, a career civil servant, has had a long innings in the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), dating from May 1956. 

He has enjoyed the unique distinction of serving in different capacities, ranging from that of the Chief Secretary in the State of Rajasthan; Commonwealth Secretariat Adviser on Export Industrialization and Policy in Colombo from May 1981 to May 1984; Adviser to Governor of Jammu & Kashmir in 1986; and successively Secretary to the crucial Ministries of Water Resources, Defense, Interior and Justice from 1987 to 1990 in the Federal Indian Government.  He achieved the acme of his career, when in December 1990 he became Cabinet Secretary, the highest post in the entire Indian Civil Service. He retired from that position in July 1992. He was also a Member of the Indian Space Commission and the Indian Atomic Energy Commission from 1990 to 1992. 

In August 1992, he was appointed a Senior Adviser to the Prime Minister of India.  His last assignment was as the Governor of the State of Gujarat.

He assumed the post of the Ambassador of India to the United States in April 1996.

Ambassador Chandra's long official association with the United States spans more than three decades, beginning with his first visit to this country in 1963-64.  He has been the Indian Co-chairman of the US-India Technology Group, and Member of the Indo-US Economic Sub-Commission, which lent him valuable insight into the broad range of Indo-US relations.  Following the economic liberalization program in India, he led the first official delegation to the US in 1992 to promote US investments in India.  He has been deeply involved in several important conferences organized subsequently in the US by business development groups.

Ambassador Chandra is a post-graduate Mathematics alumnus of the prestigious Allahabad University, where he also had a brief stint at teaching.   He is 64 years old and unmarried.