Er.Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya was born on 15 September 1861 to a Brahmin family, to Mokshagundam Srinivasa Shastry and Venkatalakshmamma in Muddenahalli village, Chikkaballapura District (bifurcated from Kolar District), Mysore State (now Karnataka), India. His Father was a noted Sanskrit scholar.

Er.Visvesvaraya lost his Father at the age of 12. He enrolled for the primary school in Chickballapur and attended high school in Bangalore. He received a BA degree from Central College, Bangalore, (then an affiliate of the University of Madras) in 1881 and later studied at College of Engineering, Pune. He received LCE (Licenciate in Civil Engineering) equal to DCE (Diploma in Civil Engineering) from University of Bombay to which college was affiliated.

He designed and patented a system of automatic weir water floodgates that were first installed in 1903 at Khadakvasla Reservoir near Pune. These gates were employed to raise flood supply level of storage in reservoir to the highest level likely to be attained without causing any damage to the dam. Based on the success of these gates, the same system was installed at the Tigra Dam in Gwalior and Krishna Raja Sagara (KRS) Dam in Mandya/Mysore, Karnataka.

In 1906–07, Government of India sent him to Aden to study water supply and drainage systems. The project prepared by him was implemented in Aden successfully.

After opting for voluntary retirement in 1908, he took a foreign tour to study industrialised nations. After, for a short period, he worked for the Nizam of Hyderabad, India. He suggested flood relief measures for Hyderabad town, which was under constant threat by the Musi river. During November 1909, Visvesvaraya was appointed as chief Engineer of Mysore State. Further, during 1912, he was appointed as diwan (second minister) of the princely state of Mysore. He was diwan for seven years.

Visvesvaraya was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire (CIE) in 1911. In 1915, while he was the Diwan of Mysore, Visvesvaraya was knighted as a Knight Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire (KCIE) by the British for his myriad contributions to the public good. After India attained independence, he was awarded the nation's highest honour, the Bharat Ratna, in 1955. Sir M.V. was awarded honorary membership of the London Institution of Civil Engineers. He was awarded a fellowship of the Indian Institute of Science (based in Bangalore). He was awarded several honorary doctoral degrees including D.Sc., LL.D., D.Litt. from eight universities in India. He was President of the 1923 session of the Indian Science Congress. He was the most popular person from Karnataka, in a newspaper survey conducted by Prajavani.

He was instrumental in the founding of the Government Engineering College at Bangalore in 1917, one of the first engineering institutes in India. This institution was later named the University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering after its founder. He commissioned several new railway lines in Mysore state.

Sir Er.M.Visvesvaraya is known to have designed and planned the entire area of Jayanagar in south Bangalore. The foundation of Jayanagar was laid in 1959. It was one of first planned neighbourhoods in Bangalore and, at the time, the largest in Asia. It is believed that locality, designed by Er.M.Visvesvaraya, is one of the best-planned layouts in Asia.