VENUGOPAL IS NEW ATTORNEY-GENERAL

NEW DELHI: Constitution expert and senior advocate K.K. Venugopal was on Friday appointed the 15th AttorneyGeneral of India. At 86, he will be the oldest A-G ever to hold the top legal post in the government.

Constitution expert and senior advocate K.K. Venugopal was on Friday appointed the 15th Attorney-General of India. At 86, he will be the oldest A-G ever to hold the top legal post in the government.

Venugopal succeeds Mukul Rohatgi (61), who had turned down the offer of an extension after his three-year stint to get back to private practice.

Venugopal, who hails from Kerala, had held the office of the additional solicitor-general during the Morarji Desai government in the late seventies. Rohatgi was also previously an additional solicitor-general.

Starting his legal career from Mysore in 1954, Venugopal has been practising in the Supreme Court since 1960. He was designated as a senior advocate in 1972.

Venugopal was designated amicus curie (friend of court) by the Supreme Court in many cases to assist the top court. Among the famous cases he handled include the Mandal case, the Ayodhya dispute, presidential reference to appointment of judges as also the DA case of former Tamil Nadu chief minister, the late J. Jayalaithaa.

Venugopal was also counsel of BJP patriarch Lal Krishna Advani in the Babri Masjid demolition case and represented BSP supremo Mayawati in a corruption case.