‘Blog Minister’ Jaitley is an editor’s delight

India’s former finance minister has half a dozen luxury vehicles, including top-end BMWs and sports cars, but has never learnt to drive

The talented Arun Jaitley is a man of many parts: India’s Finance Minister, currently minister without portfolio, one of India’s leading corporate lawyers, cricket fanatic and administrator and blogger.

But having interviewed him more than a dozen times, I can truly say he has missed his real vocation in life: That of being a newspaper editor. Despite that, he is still called “Bureau Chief” for his absolute grasp of the media in Delhi. It is useful to remember that he has represented virtually all newspaper proprietors and media owners in court.

This hold has ensured that the media treats Jaitley with kid gloves. Jaitley’s kidney transplant and his inability to work for two months was not considered “news”. I broke the story, as I felt that the health of a public representative holding a critical portfolio needed to be reported in the public interest.

Shockingly, just ten days before the federal budget was to be presented, Jaitley left for the United States for treatment of soft tissue cancer. Again, the media maintained silence.

When Piyush Goyal presented the budget, most citizens would have been confused as to what was going on. After presenting the budget, Goyal gave the customary round of interviews in which he defended the populist budget and rubbished the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) report, which said employment in India was at a four-decade low.

We then had the bizarre spectacle of Jaitley speaking to an agency in the US and making the same points that Goyal had made.

From his perch in the US, Jaitley had also issued an unprecedented warning to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to handle the criminal case against sacked ICICI Bank CEO Chanda Kochhar in a “professional” way and not to be “adventurist”. This public warning was issued on social media and to an investigative agency that does not come under Jaitley’s remit. Kochhar was sacked the next day after Justice Srikrishna found that she had broken the code of conduct in the bank.

So why would a man, under treatment for a serious disease, meddle in all matters? That in a nutshell is Jaitley — a man with a finger in every power pie in Lutyens’ Delhi, the quintessential counsellor to the powerful. And that is what makes him indispensable to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Consider this. The only election Jaitley has ever won has been the presidency of Delhi University. Even in the Modi wave in 2014, Jaitley lost.

Trouble is that, while he is an excellent parliamentarian, Jaitley practises his politics like a lawyer. Which is why despite being the BJP’s urbane face, he is widely disliked in the party.

Jaitley has a penchant for Jermyn Street shirts, deciding on a particular colour with his “friends durbar” every season and bespoke Savile Row suits. He loves all the finer things in life, including rare Jamevar shawls, possesses a huge collection of diamonds and watches, which he loves to show off to all and sundry. Jaitley has nearly half a dozen luxury vehicles, many of them top-end BMWs and sports cars, but ironically, has never learnt to drive.

Ironically, Goyal presented an election-year budget packed with promises of giveaways and got lusty cheers from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) members of parliament, something Jaitley could never achieve in his middling budgets.

Jaitley was Modi’s eyes and ears in Delhi. His crucial outreach has reaped abundant rewards. He’s been extremely lucky, getting the lion’s share of portfolios. Jaitley still regularly interferes with the Law Ministry. While an objective assessment of his handling of finance would reveal a very poor performance, such assessments are not made either by a Jaitley-friendly media or Modi.

Former BJP leader Arun Shourie says the BJP is a party of two-and-a-half men. The half being Jaitley. So what next for Jaitley?

He has undergone surgery in the US and it is unclear when he will return. But Jaitley is determined not to fade from the public stage. Will he continue to write scathing blogs, which take potshots at “urban Naxals” and all other enemies of Modi?

He’s got a brief to defend and the writing skills to spin, which most editors can only dream of.

■ Swati Chaturvedi is an award-winning print and broadcast journalist. Her book I am a Troll — Inside the BJP’s secret digital army has received international acclaim. Twitter: @Bainjal.