Benjamin Jowett was Master of Balliol College, Oxford, from 1870 to 1893. He had been Regius Professor of Greek from 1855 and was made Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford in 1882. While Jowett was Master of Balliol, forty-nine Indians were at the university, and twenty-two of those at Balliol. Jowett had the reputation of attracting students from all over the world. He was particularly concerned with university reform and was consulted on reforms to the Indian Civil Service. Jowett saw three successive viceroys of India come through Balliol (Lansdowne, Elgin, Curzon), and many young men undertook their probationary training for the ICS at Balliol. As Vice-Chancellor, Jowett opened the Indian Institute in Oxford on 14 October 1884.

Jowett notably befriended Cornelia Sorabji, sister of Richard Sorabji who was at Balliol 1890-3. Cornelia Sorabji studed law at Somerville College, 1889-93, and was the first woman to study law at Oxford. Jowett introduced Sorabji to leading contemporary figures in politics, law, social service, and literature while she was at Oxford. 

Having been schooled in Cuttack, Orissa, where his father worked as a lawyer, Subhas Chandra Bose went to Calcutta in 1913 and joined Presidency College. In 1916, Bose was expelled for his complicity in beating a college tutor, Professor Oaten, whom he had heard had manhandled some Indian students. Bose had been involved in student political groups in Calcutta and received much sympathy for his expulsion. He joined Scottish Church College and graduated in 1919 with a degree in philosophy.

Bose's father proposed to send him to England to study for the Indian Civil Service (ICS). Despite Bose's misgivings about accepting a job under the British Government, he set sail for England in September 1919. Upon arriving in Britain, Bose went up to Cambridge to gain admission. He managed to gain entry to Fitzwilliam Hall, a body for non-collegiate members of the University. Bose took the Mental and Moral Sciences Tripos and studied for the Civil Service exams. He attended the Cambridge Union Society debates and was a member of the Cambridge Majlis. He gave evidence to the Lytton Committee investigating Indian students in the UK, and appealed to the India Office to allow Indians to join the University Officers' Training Corps (without success).

In July 1920, Bose took the ICS exams in London and came fourth. Bose then faced a dilemma as to whether to take up this opportunity and sought advice from his family through correspondence to India. Finally in April 1921, Bose withdrew from taking up this post with the ICS and returned to India in the summer of 1921.

In Calcutta, Bose joined the Indian National Congress and worked with the Bengali leader C. R. Das. Bose was in and out of jail in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s for his political action (often violent) against the British. In the meantime, he rose through the Congress ranks, working with Nehru, and became president of Congress in 1938. Successful again in 1939 against Gandhi's candidate, Bose then resigned over the selection of the working committee.

In 1941, Bose managed to leave India through Afghanistan. In 1943, Bose was in Japan and supported the Prime Minister's efforts to reconstitute the Indian National Army (INA) and set up the 'Azad Hind' or Free India provisional government. In 1944, the INA and Japanese invaded India but suffered a heavy defeat. Bose fled and was killed in a plane crash over Taiwan in August 1945 - although many of his followers remain(ed) doubtful as to the cause of his death, wondering if he had managed to escape the crash.

Surendranath Banerjea was born in 1848 in Calcutta. From childhood, his father had planned to send Banerjea to England to complete his education, and on 3 March 1868, Banerjea set sail for England with Romesh Chunder Dutt and Behari Lal Gupta. All three had made the arrangements in secret - Banerjea's mother was not aware of his trip until the day before. At Southampton they were met by W. C. Bonnnerjee and taken to London.

All three competed in the Indian Civil Service open exams. Banerjea passed in 1869, but was disqualified over a mix-up over his age. Although Banerjea was 21 (the maximum age to compete for the ICS exam), his matriculation certificate has used the Indian measure of age (where someone is aged 1 from birth) and so the examiners believed he was 22. Banerjea took the matter to court and eventually won his case in 1870. During his time in London, Banerjea also attended classes at University College, London. He took his final exams in 1871 and returned to India in August 1871.

Banerjea was posted to Sylhet as an Assistant Magistrate but, not long after, was sacked over a clerical error. In 1874, Banerjea returned to London and became a student at the Middle Temple. However, because of his dismissal from the Civil Service, the benchers declined to call him to the Bar and he returned again to India in 1875. Banerjea took up a number of posts teaching English and became more politically active. In 1875, he formed the British Indian Association, which was seen as a prototype nationalist organization. He campaigned against the Ilbert Bill and became a member of the Indian National Congress soon after its formation in 1885. He was vocal in opposition to the partition of Bengal in 1905. In 1879, he became the proprieter and editor of The Bengalee.

In 1909, Banerjea visited London again to attend the Imperial Press Conference. He was in the city when Madan Lal Dhingra assassinated Curzon-Wyllie. Banerjea sent an open letter condemning Dhingra's actions to the press. Banerjea became more moderate in his political sensibilities as time progressed. He left Congress following the 1919 Montagu-Chelmsford reforms because he supported the reforms as opposed to Gandhi's non-cooperation. He accepted a knighthood from the British in 1919.

K. P. S. Menon joined Oxford after the end of the First World War. He was President of the Oxford Majlis for a term in 1920. 

Menon served in the Madras ICS until 1924 when he was transferred to the Foreign and Political Department as Under-Secretary to the Resident of Hyderabad. In 1939, he was appointed as Chief Minister of Bharatpur, then Ambassador to China after independence, Foreign Secretary from 1948 to 1952 and then Ambassador to Moscow.

N. B. Bonarjee was born in 1901 in Lucknow. His grandfather had converted to Christianity in 1847, and his father had travelled to London in 1885 to compete unsuccessfully for the Indian Civil Service. In 1904, Bonarjee's family went to England. His father entered Lincoln's Inn and his mother became honorary secretary of the Indian Women's Education Association in London. In 1910, Bonarjee joined Dulwich Prepatory School and his parents returned to India leaving their children in the care of guardians. His elder brother and sister attended the University of Wales in Aberystwyth, but Bonarjee joined Hertford College, Oxford in 1919. He was a member of the college Rugby XV and took up ballroom dancing. He obtained his history degree in 1922 and then became a temporary schoolmaster at Dulwich for a year.

In 1924, he took the ICS exams and returned to India in 1924 (after twenty years in England) as an ICS man. He was initially posted in U.P. and rose through the ranks to become District Magistrate in Meerut in the 1940s. He took up a number of key government posts and was Chief Minister of UP at Indian independence. After independence, he was Chief Commissioner of Bhopal, the last of the princely states, for a year.

In his autobiography, Under Two Masters, published in 1970, Bonarjee talks about the prejudices he faced as a child, and his experiences upon returning to India after so many years in Britain.

Romesh Chunder Dutt was the son of Ishanchandra and Thakamani Dutt. They were part of one of the Calcutta families who had prospered through their commercial associations with the British East India Company. In 1868, he left for Britain in secret in the company of two friends, Bihari Lal Gupta and Surendranath Banerjea. In London, Dutt secured admission to University College and sat for the Indian Civil Service examination in 1871. Dutt was called to the Bar at the Middle Temple in the same year. He joined the Indian Civil Service as assistant magistrate and collector. In 1883 he was the first Indian to be appointed district magistrate and, after serving in many districts of Bengal, was appointed divisional commissioner, first in Burdwan and later in Orissa (1894–5).

When the premier literary association of Bengal, Bangiya Sahitya Parishad, was set up in 1894, Dutt was elected its first President. In 1899 Dutt was invited to preside over the fifteenth session of the Indian National Congress held at Lucknow, and in 1905 he presided over the industrial exhibition held in Benares in connection with the twenty-first session of the Congress. Dutt shared his time between London and India. In 1897, he was appointed Professor of Indian History at University College, London. From 1898, Dutt regularly wrote letters to the Editor of The Manchester Guardian on Indian matters, particularly famine and tariffs. A collection of these letters was published in 1900. Dutt also wrote a number of works on history, economics and translations of Indian Classics for the 'Temple Classics' series.

With Major B. D. Basu and Dadabhai Naoroji, Dutt formulated what is now recognized as the classic diagnosis of the Indian economic problem under colonial rule. It emphasized the ‘drainage of wealth’ from India through home charges payable to Britain and unrequited exports, the absence of protection for India's infant industries, and the negative implications of even constructive efforts like the railways, which deprived many providers of traditional transport services and facilitated the import of British manufactured goods.

First Indian to enter the Indian Civil Service (ICS) through the competitive exams in London. Elder brother of Rabindranath Tagore (second son of Debendranath Tagore). Posted to the Bombay ICS, where he served his entire career from 1864 to 1897. His wife is said to have introduced/adapted the use of wearing a blouse with a sari for Bengali women.