Arun Jaitley (born December 28, 1952), or Jaitly, is an Indian politician and has served as a minister for commerce, industry, law and justice of the Union Government of India.
He was born in New Delhi. He did his schooling at St. Xavier's School, New Delhi, finishing school in 1969-70. He graduated in Commerce from Shri Ram College of Commerce, New Delhi (1973). He graduated in Law from the Faculty of Law, University of Delhi in 1977. He was President of the Delhi University Students Union during this time.
He has been practicing law before the Supreme Court of India and several High Courts in the country since 1977. He is a designated Senior Advocate. He was the Additional Solicitor General of India for the Government of India in the year 1990. He has authored several publications on legal and current affairs. He has presented a Paper on Law relating to Corruption and Crime in India before the Indo British Legal Forum. He was a delegate on behalf of the Government of India to the United Nations General Assembly Session in June 1998 where the Declaration on Law relating to Drugs and Money Laundering was approved.
Arun Jaitley became the spokesman of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) during the period preceding the 1999 general election. He has since been accused by several in the party of giving off-the-record briefings to spread rumours. Subsequently, he joined the council of ministers as the Minister of State with independent charge of the newly created Department of Disinvestment on October 13, 1999. He took over as Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting (independent charge) in 1999 and got additional charge of the Ministry of Law, Justice and Company Affairs. On November 7, 2000 he was elevated as a Cabinet Minister with the charge of Law, Justice and Company Affairs and the additional charge of the Ministry of Shipping. He demitted office as Union Minister of Law, Justice and Company Affairs on July 1, 2002 to join as General Secretary of the BJP and functioned as its national spokesman till January, 2003. He joined the Union Cabinet again as the Minister of Commerce & Industry and Law & Justice on 29 January, 2003.
On January 28, 2004, he announced the cabinet decision to free gold and silver imports from restrictions. With the defeat of the National Democratic Alliance (India) in May 2004, Jaitley returned to serving the Bharatiya Janata Party as a General Secretary, and back to his legal career. He is currently representing the Birla family in their legal battle against R. S. Lodha on the question of ownership of Birla Corporation Limited. He is currently a Rajya Sabha member from Gujarat (as of March 2006) and has never contested any election.
