He was the vice-chancellor of Rajasthan University and founder chairman of the Jaipur-based Institute of Development Studies, also known as IDS.
Born in 1915 in Alwar in British India, Mathur was the Vice-Chancellor of Rajasthan University from 1966 to 1968.
Later he became Director General of the National Council of Applied Economic Research from 1974 to 1975, and eventually Director of the National Institute of Education Planning and Administration from 1975 to 1980 and worked for several commissions and committees.
He also headed a committee of the Rajasthan Government on reorganisation of universities in the State from 1978 to 1980.
In his final years, Mathur lived in the United States, where he died in Baltimore, Maryland, on 21 January 2004.