Prof. Dr. Ehsan Rashid laid the foundation of the Applied Economics Research Centre (AERC), and was its first director. He was an eminent economists and former Vice Chancellor of the University of Karachi.   Son of a celebrated man of letters, Prof Rashid Ahmad Siddiqui, Dr. Rashid was a brilliant student of Aligarh University, where he also taught for a few years as lecturer after doing his master's in economics. He took his doctorate degree from the University of Bonn on Joseph Schumpeter's Theory of Innovation in 1956.
After coming to Pakistan, he was appointed reader at the University of Karachi  and later as the head of the Economics Department. In 1973, he was appointed as the Director AERC, an Institute of National Capability in Applied Economics. In 1976 he was posted as the Vice Chancellor of the University of Karachi in which capacity he struggled to turn the university into an autonomous institution by pleading less interference in the academic affairs of the university. When he saw he could not resist these, he resigned from his post. He was a widely-read man and proficient in Persian, English and Urdu.
In 1980 he became a visiting professor at Harvard University for a year and after returning from Harvard he was sent to Jordan as ambassador of Pakistan, where he served the country for over four years. He also remained a member of the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, Chairman of the Pakistan Economists and Bankers Committee of Islamic Ideology Council. He also headed the AERC from July 1973 to August 1979, August  1986 to October 1987 and May 1988 to May 1990.  He was also appointed chairman of the Pakistan Islamization Commission. His last appointment was as Rector of Islamic University, Islamabad. He died on Wednesday, February 13 2002 at the ages of seventy five.