Ram Jethmalani

Ram Jethmalani Biography

Ram Jethmalani is an Indian politician and a lawyer who served as the Union Law Minister. He is noted for representing controversial cases and is the highest paid lawyer in India. He has also served as the Chairman of Bar Associations.

He was born Shikharpur in Sindh which is a part of Pakistan at present. After completing law at an early age of 18 he moved to Mumbai as a refuge to try his luck. He married Durga at his age of 18 and also married Ratna Shehani. He has four children namely Rani, Shobha, Mahesh and Ratna and among them Mahesh Jethmalani and Rani Jethmalani are lawyers.

Before the partition of India, he started his career as a professor in Pakistan. He then started his law firm in Karachi and the riots of 1948 made him come to India. He worked his way to become the Chief Justice of India. As he defended the smugglers in a case, he was known as smuggler’s lawyer.

He worked as a professor in the Government Law College at Mumbai in 1953. He also worked at the Wayne State University in Detroit in Michigan where he taught the Comparative Law. He was a member of the International Bar Council and was the Chairman of the Bar Council of India.

He contested as an independent candidate in 1971 in Ulhasnagar constituency and lost. He criticized the then Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi during the emergency period. He contested in the general election in 1980 and won but lost in 1985. He served as the member of Rajya Sabha in 1988. He got the portfolio of Union Minister of Urban Affairs and Employment in 1998 and served as the Union Minister of Law, Justice and Company Affairs for quite sometimes.

He contested as an independent candidate against Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2004 elections and lost. He was given Rajya Sabha seat in 2010 by Bharatiya Janta Party from Rajasthan. He was therefore criticized for being opportunistic.

Some of the important cases he defended are the defense of Rajiv Gandhi’s killers, defense of Indira Gandhi’s killers, defense of Harshad Mehta and Ketan Parekh in stock market scam, defense of Afzal Guru, Underworld don Haji Mastan, Manu Sharma in Jessica Lall murder case, defense of Kanimozhi in Spectrum 2G case, Yeddyurappa’s case on illegal mining scam, etc.

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Updated: February 01, 2013