Nisha Pillai

Nisha Pillai
Pillai moderating a discussion at an ITU conference.
Born	Kolkata, India
Education	LSE
Occupation	News presenter
Agent	JLA, Hilary Knight, Kate Moon
Notable credit(s)	Panorama "The Max Factor" BBC World News live on 9/11
Children	2
Website	nishapillai.com

Nisha Pillai is a journalist based in London. She is one of the main news anchors with BBC World News.

Pillai was born in Kolkata, India, and grew up in Mumbai. When she was 14, her family moved to London, England. She attended a girls school in Birmingham, then graduated in analytical economics at the London School of Economics.

After university she joined Schroders Investment Bank, then moved into journalism with the weekly Investors Chronicle. Pillai joined the BBC in 1986, first working on The Money Programme, then Panorama from 1990 to 1995. Her nine-month investigation into financial affairs of media proprietor Robert Maxwell was presented as "The Max Factor", which won an award from the Royal Television Society in 1991. Another of her notable programmes, titled "Underclass in Purdah", reported on Muslims in Britain, and predicted social turmoil and violence.

She joined the BBC World News channel in 1995 as one of the main anchors, presenting the hourly news reports. In 1997 she presented the channel's coverage of Pakistan's 50th anniversary of independence in Islamabad, and, from Jerusalem in 1998, Israel's 50th anniversary of its declaration of independence.