[1] Anil K. Bera was born in a remote village Paschimchak, West Bengal, India.

His father was a doctor who charged no formal fees from his patients and relied on voluntary contributions.

Bera attended his village school Paschimchak Primary School and Jalchak Nateswari Netaji Vidyayatan, Narendrapur Ramkrishna Mission Residential College, and the Indian Statistical Institute, Calcutta and Delhi.

In 1971, he was admitted to Ramkrishna Mission Residential College, Narendrapur in 1971 to do an Honors in Statistics with Physics and Mathematics as auxiliary subjects.

from Calcutta University in 1975 in Statistics (First Class), a master's degree from Indian Statistical Institute in 1977 in Econometrics and Planning (First Class), and a Ph.D. in 1983 from Australian National University (Phd Aspects of Econometric Modeling).