Anil Shaji was born and brought up in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. After finishing B.Sc. (Physics) from University College Thiruvananthapuram, he obtained his M.Sc. in Physics from IIT-Madras. He did his Ph.D. at the University of Texas, Austin with prof. E. C. G. Sudarshan on open quantum systems and quantum information. He did a postdoc at the University of New Mexico, working in the information physics group with Prof. Carlton M. Caves. He joined IISER - Thiruvananthapuram as an assistant professor in the school of physics in June 2009. He became associte professor in September 2014.