New Delhi: With the sad demise of BJP stalwart and former Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, India lost a dynamic leader, an eloquent speaker and a towering personality, who took a plunge into politics during the Emergency years.
A lawyer by profession, Jaitely was one of the prominent leaders in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Cabinet during his first tenure. He often acted as the chief trouble-shooter and a consensus-builder for the government.
As a Finance Minister, the veteran leader will always be remembered for his instrumental role in landmark reforms such as replacing India’s traditional indirect tax laws with a goods and services tax (GST), a step that called for support from state leaders irrespective of their political linkage.
Jaitley, a revered politician who defied dynasties and rose up the ranks through his hard work and talent, participated in demonstrations against the imposition of Emergency in 1975 by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. He was also placed under preventive detention first in Tihar jail in Delhi and then in Ambala Central Jail for 19 months. He was associated with socialist leader Jai Prakash Narayan.
He joined the BJP after its formation in 1980. His career as a politician and a lawyer progressed simultaneously together. In 1991 Jaitley was included in the BJP’s national executive, the top decision-making body of the party. Prior to the 1999 parliamentary elections, he was appointed as the party’s spokesperson, a position he also held (along with the post of party general secretary) for several months in 2002–03. He served in a variety of ministerial posts in the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) coalition government (1999–2004) under Atal Bihari Vajpayee, including minister of Law, Justice, and Company Affairs and minister of Commerce and Industry. After the NDA lost power in the 2004 elections, Jaitley was appointed as the BJP’s general secretary.
Jaitley played an instrumental role in the BJP’s landslide victory in 2014 general elections. But he lost the election in Amritsar where he contested against Captain Amarinder Singh. He did not contest the Lok Sabha elections 2019 and also chose not to be in the current Modi cabinet due to health reasons.
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