Devidas Vyankatesh Pai was born in Goa, India on Sept. 16, 1941. He completed his secondary school education in Goa and ranked second among all the successful candidates from Goa region in S.S.C. examination of Poona Board. He did his under graduate studies from Wilson College and Ismail Yusuf College, Bombay. He secured first class with distinctions, and was ranked first at B.Sc. degree examination of Bombay University. He received his M.Sc. degree from Bombay University in 1966 securing a first class with distinctions.

He worked as Associate Lecturer and Lecturer at Ismail Yusuf College and Sardar Patel College of Engineering respectively during 1963-67. Since 1967, he has been on the faculty of IIT Bombay. He joined IIT Bombay as Associate Lecturer in July 1967 and was promoted as Lecturer in 1968. He received his Ph.D. degree from IIT Bombay in 1972 while continuing to work as a faculty member. He was promoted as Assistant Professor in 1973 and as Professor in 1983. He worked as Head, Department of Mathematics, during Dec. 1983 - Dec. 1987.

He has authored / co-authored over 50 research articles in international / national journals of repute and proceedings of international/ national conferences in the areas of functional analysis and approximation theory. He has guided  10 research students for Ph.D. degree in these areas so far. He has recently co-authored the book entitled Fundamentals of Approximation Theory (with Prof. H.N. Mhaskar of Calstate L.A., U.S.A.), Narosa Publishing House, New Dehi, August 2000.

He worked as the chairman of the organizing committee of the International Conference on Methods of Functional Analysis in Approximation Theory held at IIT Bombay, Dec. 1985 and a co-editor of the proceedings of this conference published in ISNM series: ISNM76 of Birkhauser Verlag, Basel, 1986. He has held several visiting positions, as well as given several invited lecturers in North America, Europe and Middle East.

He is a recipient of MAN OF THE YEAR-2000 Decree awarded by American Biographical Institute, U.S.A.  He is also a recipient of  a best teacher award for excellence in teaching  for the year 2000 awarded by  IIT Bombay.