An Indian mathematician has won a top global honour. Mahesh Kakde has received the 2026 Ramanujan Prize for Young Mathematicians from Developing Countries.

The prize is given by ICTP and the International Mathematical Union. It recognises his work in algebraic number theory.

Kakde’s results cover noncommutative Iwasawa theory. He also worked on the Gross-Stark and Brumer-Stark conjectures. His work has links to Hilbert’s 12th problem, one of the famous unsolved problems listed in 1900.

He is a professor at the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru. He did his PhD at Cambridge in 2008. He worked at Princeton and King’s College London before joining IISc in 2019.

He won the Infosys Prize in Mathematical Sciences in 2022. He was also named in the Asian Scientist 100 list in 2023.

The Ramanujan Prize carries a cash award of 10,000 US dollars. It is named after Srinivasa Ramanujan, the legendary Indian mathematician.