Minister of Law and Justice explained

Post:	Minister of Law and Justice
Native Name:	Hindi: विधि और न्याय मंत्री
Insignia:	Ministry of Law and Justice.svg
Insigniasize:	235
Insigniacaption:	Emblem of the Ministry of Law and Justice
Incumbent:	Arjun Ram Meghwal, Minister of State (Independent Charge)
Department:	Ministry of Law and Justice
Member Of:	Cabinet of India
Reports To:	President of India Prime Minister of India Parliament of India
Appointer:	President of India
Appointer Qualified:	on the recommendation of the Prime Minister of India
First:	B. R. Ambedkar
Deputy:	Minister of State for Law and Justice

The Minister of Law and Justice is the head of the Ministry of Law and Justice and one of the cabinet ministers of the Government of India. The first Law and Justice Minister of independent India was B. R. Ambedkar, who served in first Nehru ministry during 1947–52. On 18 May 2023, Arjun Ram Meghwal replaced Kiren Rijiju and became the Minister of State (Independent Charge) of Ministry of Law and Justice.^{[1] [2]}

Titles

Ever since the ministry's creation in 1947, the ministry had undergone several changes and adopted various name. The present form of "Ministry of Law and Justice" was adopted in July 2002 after the Department of Company Affairs of the erstwhile Ministry of Law, Justice and Company Affairs was separated and made an independent ministry which was later known as the Ministry of Corporate Affairs.

• 15 August 1947 18 March 1971: Minister of Law
• 18 March 1971 5 February 1973: Minister of Law and Justice
• 5 February 1973 31 October 1984: Minister of Law, Justice and Company Affairs
• 4 November 1984 21 June 1991: Minister of Law and Justice
• 21 June 1991 1 July 2002: Minister of Law, Justice and Company Affairs
• 1 July 2002 present: Minister of Law and Justice

Cabinet Ministers

• Note: MoS, I/C Minister of State (Independent Charge)

	Portrait		Minister	Term of office			Political party	Ministry	Prime Minister
				From	To	Period
Minister of Law
1			B. R. Ambedkar	15 August 1947	11 October 1951		Scheduled Castes Federation	Nehru I		Jawaharlal Nehru
2			Kailash Nath Katju	5 November 1951	13 May 1952		Indian National Congress
3			Charu Chandra Biswas	13 May 1952	17 April 1957			Nehru II
4			Ashoke Kumar Sen (MoS until 12 May 1958)	18 April 1957	10 April 1962			Nehru III
				10 April 1962	27 May 1964			Nehru IV
				27 May 1964	9 June 1964			Nanda I		Gulzarilal Nanda
				9 June 1964	11 January 1966			Shastri		Lal Bahadur Shastri
				11 January 1966	24 January 1966			Nanda II		Gulzarilal Nanda
5			Gopal Swarup Pathak	24 January 1966	13 March 1967			Indira I		Indira Gandhi
6			Panampilly Govinda Menon	13 March 1967	23 May 1970			Indira II
7			Kengal Hanumanthaiah	26 June 1970	18 March 1971
Minister of Law and Justice
8			H. R. Gokhale	18 March 1971	5 February 1973		Indian National Congress (R)	Indira III		Indira Gandhi
Minister of Law, Justice and Company Affairs
(8)			H. R. Gokhale	5 February 1973	24 March 1977		Indian National Congress (R)	Indira III		Indira Gandhi
9			Shanti Bhushan	26 March 1977	28 July 1979		Janata Party	Desai		Morarji Desai
10			Hans Raj Khanna	30 July 1979	3 August 1979		Janata Party (Secular)	Charan		Charan Singh
11			Shyam Nath Kacker	3 August 1979	14 January 1980
12			P. Shiv Shankar	14 January 1980	15 January 1982		Indian National Congress (I)	Indira IV		Indira Gandhi
13			Jagannath Kaushal	15 January 1982	31 October 1984
Minister of Law and Justice
(13)			Jagannath Kaushal	4 November 1984	31 December 1984		Indian National Congress (I)	Rajiv I		Rajiv Gandhi
(4)			Ashoke Kumar Sen	31 December 1984	31 March 1987			Rajiv II
(12)			P. Shiv Shankar	25 July 1987	14 February 1988
14			Bindeshwari Dubey	14 February 1988	26 June 1988
15			B. Shankaranand	25 June 1988	2 December 1989
16			Dinesh Goswami	6 December 1989	10 November 1990		Asom Gana Parishad	Vishwanath		Vishwanath Pratap Singh
17			Subramanian Swamy	21 November 1990	21 June 1991		Janata Party	Chandra Shekhar		Chandra Shekhar
Minister of Law, Justice and Company Affairs
18			Kotla Vijaya Bhaskara Reddy	21 June 1991	9 October 1992		Indian National Congress (I)	Rao		P. V. Narasimha Rao
			P. V. Narasimha Rao (Prime Minister)	9 October 1992	16 May 1996
19			Ram Jethmalani	16 May 1996	1 June 1996		Independent	Vajpayee I		Atal Bihari Vajpayee
20			P. Chidambaram	1 June 1996	29 June 1996		Tamil Maanila Congress	Deve Gowda		H. D. Deve Gowda
21			Ramakant Khalap (MoS, I/C)	29 June 1996	21 April 1997		Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party
				21 April 1997	19 March 1998			Gujral		Inder Kumar Gujral
22			M. Thambidurai	19 March 1998	8 April 1999	.	All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam	Vajpayee II		Atal Bihari Vajpayee
23			Rangarajan Kumaramangalam	9 April 1999	8 June 1999		Bharatiya Janata Party
(19)			Ram Jethmalani	8 June 1999	13 October 1999		Independent
				13 October 1999	23 July 2000			Vajpayee III
24			Arun Jaitley (MoS, I/C until 7 November 2000)	24 July 2000	1 July 2002		Bharatiya Janata Party
Minister of Law and Justice
25			Jana Krishnamurthi	1 July 2002	29 January 2003		Bharatiya Janata Party	Vajpayee III		Atal Bihari Vajpayee
(24)			Arun Jaitley	29 January 2003	22 May 2004
26			H. R. Bhardwaj	23 May 2004	22 May 2009		Indian National Congress	Manmohan I		Manmohan Singh
27			Veerappa Moily	28 May 2009	12 July 2011			Manmohan II
28			Salman Khurshid	12 July 2011	28 October 2012
29			Ashwani Kumar	28 October 2012	11 May 2013
30			Kapil Sibal	11 May 2013	26 May 2014
31			Ravi Shankar Prasad	27 May 2014	9 November 2014		Bharatiya Janata Party	Modi I		Narendra Modi
32			D. V. Sadananda Gowda	9 November 2014	5 July 2016
(31)			Ravi Shankar Prasad	5 July 2016	30 May 2019
				31 May 2019	7 July 2021			Modi II
33			Kiren Rijiju	7 July 2021	18 May 2023
34			Arjun Ram Meghwal (MoS, I/C)	18 May 2023	9 June 2024
				10 June 2024	Incumbent			Modi III

Ministers of State

	Portrait		Minister	Term of office			Political party	Ministry	Prime Minister
				From	To	Period
Minister of State for Law
1			Hari Vinayak Pataskar (Minister of Legal Affairs, from 23 August 1955)	7 December 1954	16 April 1957		Indian National Congress	Nehru II		Jawaharlal Nehru
2			Ramchandra Martand Hajarnavis	29 October 1965	11 January 1966		Indian National Congress	Shastri		Lal Bahadur Shastri
3			C. R. Pattabhiraman	24 January 1966	13 March 1967		Indian National Congress	Indira I		Indira Gandhi
4			Kotha Raghuramaiah	13 March 1967	18 March 1967			Indira II
5			Phulrenu Guha	14 February 1969	26 June 1970		Indian National Congress (R)	Indira II
6			Jagannath Rao	27 June 1970	18 March 1971
Minister of State for Law and Justice
7			Nitiraj Singh Chaudhary	18 March 1971	5 February 1973		Indian National Congress (R)	Indira III		Indira Gandhi
Minister of State for Law, Justice and Company Affairs
(7)			Nitiraj Singh Chaudhary	5 February 1973	17 October 1974		Indian National Congress (R)	Indira III		Indira Gandhi
8			Dajisaheb Chavan	5 February 1973	8 July 1973
9			Sarojini Mahishi	10 October 1974	3 January 1976
10			V. A. Seyid Muhammad	25 December 1975	24 March 1977
11			Narsingh Yadav	14 August 1977	11 July 1978		Janata Party	Desai		Morarji Desai
12			S. D. Patil	20 February 1979	28 July 1979
13			A. A. Rahim	15 January 1982	2 September 1982		Indian National Congress (I)	Indira IV		Indira Gandhi
Minister of State for Law and Justice
14			H. R. Bhardwaj	31 December 1984	2 December 1989		Indian National Congress (I)	Rajiv II		Rajiv Gandhi
Minister of State for Law, Justice and Company Affairs
15			Rangarajan Kumaramangalam	21 June 1991	2 September 1992		Indian National Congress (I)	Rao		P. V. Narasimha Rao
(14)			H. R. Bhardwaj	2 September 1992	16 May 1996
16			O. Rajagopal	13 October 1999	24 July 2000		Bharatiya Janata Party	Vajpayee III		Atal Bihari Vajpayee
Minister of State for Law and Justice
17			Ravi Shankar Prasad	1 July 2002	29 January 2003		Bharatiya Janata Party	Vajpayee III		Atal Bihari Vajpayee
18			P. C. Thomas	24 May 2003	22 May 2004		Kerala Congress
19			K. Venkatapathy	23 May 2004	22 May 2009		Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam	Manmohan I		Manmohan Singh
20			P. P. Chaudhary	5 July 2016	30 May 2019		Bharatiya Janata Party	Modi I		Narendra Modi
21			S. P. Singh Baghel	7 July 2021	18 May 2023		Bharatiya Janata Party	Modi II

External links

• Law & Justice Minister Ministry, Official website

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Notes and References

1. News: Arjun Ram Meghwal is the New Union Law Minister, Kiren Rijiju Moves to Earth Sciences Ministry . 18 May 2023 . News18 . 18 May 2023 . en.
2. News: Kiren Rijiju Replaced As Law Minister, Shifted To Earth Sciences . 18 May 2023 . NDTV.com.