Mahadev Haribhai Desai (1 January 1892 – 15 August 1942) was an Indian independence activist, scholar and writer best remembered as Mahatma Gandhi's personal secretary.

Desai graduated with a BA Degree, and after earning his L.L.B in 1913 took a job as an inspector at the central co-operative bank in Bombay[citation needed] Mahadev Desai first met Gandhi in 1915 when he went to meet him to seek his advice on how best to publish his book (a Gujrati translation of John Morley's English book On Compromise).

[2] In 1920, Motilal Nehru requisitioned the services of Mahadev Desai from Gandhi to run his newspaper, the Independent, from Allahabad.

Desai created a sensation by bringing out a hand-written cyclostyled newspaper after the Independent's printing press was confiscated by the British government.

[4] Desai took over as editor of Navajivan in 1924 and from 1925 he began the translation into English of Gandhi's autobiography and its serial publication in the Young India.

The following year he became chairman of the executive committee of the Satyagraha Ashram and won a prize from the Gujarati Sahitya Parishad for his article in Navajivan.

The colonial government, under the new Viceroy, Lord Willingdon, was determined to crush the movement and ordered a clampdown on the Indian National Congress and its activists.

[5] He also played a role in organising people's movements in the princely states of Rajkot and Mysore in 1939 and was put in charge of selecting satyagrahis during the Individual Satyagraha of 1940.

He was arrested on the morning of 9 August 1942 and, till his death of a massive heart-attack six days later, was interred with Gandhi at the Aga Khan Palace.

He also frequently contributed to various nationalist Indian newspapers such as Free Press, The Bombay Chronicle, Hindustan Times, The Hindu and Amrita Bazar Patrika.

He wrote several works in English including Gandhiji in Indian Villages (1927), With Gandhiji in Ceylon (1928), The Story of Bardoli (1929), Unworthy of Vardha (1943), The Eclipse of Faith (1943), A Righteous Struggle (1951) and Gospel of Selfless Action or The Geeta According to Gandhi (1946, translation of Anasaktiyoga by Gandhi).

[9] Aged 50, Mahadev Desai died of a heart attack on the morning of 15 August 1942 at the Aga Khan Palace where he was interned with Gandhi.