Sir Chettur Sankaran Nair (1857-1934) was an acclaimed lawyer and judge in the Madras High Court.
He simultaneously opposed the extreme Indian nationalist movement led by Mohandas K. Gandhi and its forcible suppression by the British Indian government.
He upheld conversion to Hinduism and ruled that such converts were not outcasts.
He presided at Amraoti session (1897) of Indian National Congress.
In 1902 Lord Curzon appointed him a member of the Raleigh University Commission.
Sankaran Nair was knighted in 1912.
In 1915 he joined the Viceroy’s Council as member for education.
He resigned from the council in 1919 in protest against the protracted use of martial law to quell unrest in the Punjab (Jallianwala Bagh massacre)