These large works occupy the Isolotto warehouse in the Arsenale, the India Pavilion at the 61st International Art exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia (Venice Biennale), which opened to the public on May 9. The pavilion was inaugurated by the Union minister of culture and tourism Gajendra Singh Shekhawat in the presence of the culture secretary Vivek Aggarwal, and India’s ambassador to Italy Vani Rao, last week (on May 6). The Union ministry of culture and tourism partnered with the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre and Serendipity Arts to present the pavilion. The last time India was officially invited was in 2011; the festival itself first took place in Venice in Italy in 1895.

Curated by Amin Jaffer, the pavilion features the works of five artists — Alwar Balasubramaniam, Ranjani Shettar, Sumakshi Singh, Skarma Sonam Tashi and Asim Waqif — unusual for a national pavilion that typically features only one or two artists. All five Indian artists, who hail from different parts of the country, worked across a range of materials to create large-scale installations based on Jaffer’s curatorial prompt, “geographies of distance: remembering home.”

The framework provided by the biennale’s curator Koyo Kouoh, who passed away last May, was titled, “In minor keys”. “An exhibition tuned into the minor keys (is) an exhibition that invites listening to the persistent signals of earth and life, connecting to soul frequencies. (…) The 61st edition of the Biennale Arte is grounded in a deep belief in artists as the vital interpreters of the social and psychic condition and catalysts of new relations and possibilities,” her curatorial note, released two weeks after her death, stated.

“I reflected deeply on the title, which refers to the notes on the piano keyboard which are elegiac and tender. Since my early academic career I have been interested in notions of home, domestic comfort and identity, driven by my own circumstances as an Indian born to a family outside the country for many generations, but with a strong sense of Indian identity. In developing a concept for the pavilion that reflected the Biennale’s overall theme, I returned to the question of home. The experience of India’s rapid urban transformation — through sustained demographic and economic growth accompanied by a technological boom — made me reflect on the yearning for home as it used to be. This is no doubt because I have been revisiting towns and cities in India whose redevelopment has entirely renewed them, rendering them difficult to recognise,” said Jaffer.

“There were a few criteria in our selection of the artists. We wanted to showcase a mix of emerging artists as well as established ones, with different levels of exposure to the international market. Tashi, for instance, is absolutely unknown but can be a sensation in the future. Some are slightly more exposed like Sumakshi and Bala. The second criterion is that we wanted to completely cover the diversity of the country, as well as the different materials that represent local craftsmanship and livelihoods,” said Aggarwal.

Here’s a look at the five artists of the national pavilion:

Sumakshi Singh: Permanent Address

The Delhi-based artist, who works across mediums from paint to threadwork, revisits her grandparents’ home, which once stood on 33 Link Road in New Delhi, in her latest installation at the India pavilion. The home, which her grandparents began to stay in after they came to India as post-Partition refugees, was central to Singh’s childhood. “They built it by 1950-52. It was our family home for over 74 years till it was demolished two years ago. It was where my mother was born and where my grandfather died. It’s the home where all my cousins were married off from. It’s every single summer holiday, winter holiday, sleepover, meal, important occasion — everything happened around this house, which was our anchor.”

Before the house came down, Singh returned and measured it, noting down every crack on the wall and broken fragment of brick. She recorded the texture of peeling walls, the size of the hinges and bolts. Then she got to work. She recreated these walls and doors in life-size dimensions, albeit in embroidered panels held suspended over thin steel frames measured with precision down to the “quarter of a millimeter.”

Singh, who worked with a team of four embroiderers to make these panels over soluble fabric, wanted the installation to be immersive, “where people would walk through architectural fragments of a broken home”, “a home that you can’t inhabit any longer, whose walls don’t support you, and which you can’t enter. It’s fugitive, and subtle. It’s a home that only lives within me, held by memory,” Singh said.

“This work, I feel, echoes a very common human longing, which is a desire to belong to a place that sometimes may no longer exist,” Singh said.

“Sumakshi Singh’s project to reconstruct in thread and embroidery her demolished family house in Delhi struck a deep chord in me; in a way the work hits at the heart of the pavilion. Emotive and significant culturally – given the importance of India as a textile-producing economy – I found it to be contemporary while being deeply grounded in Indian tradition,” Jaffer added.

Skarma Sonam Tashi: Echoes of Home

Tashi, who grew up in a small village in Kargil called Sapi, still recalls his childhood with precision — the fields, the cows, the scraggy landscape. At the age of five, however, he was sent off to Leh, which had better schools. Since then, he has only travelled further and further away from his village home — first to Santiniketan, where he completed his Masters in Fine Arts, and then to Delhi, where he found work, and now to Venice, where his installation forms one of five artworks in the national pavilion.

“Amin Jaffer’s curatorial title, “geographies of distance”, really resonated with me. The education system is set up in such a way that we are pushed further and further out of our homes. I wish it was different,” Tashi said.

This nostalgia drives Tashi’s practise. “My work is connected to the landscape and the architecture of the place I hail from. In Ladakh, we use a lot of locally-sourced material like stone, sand, and wood. People understand the environment they live in, and use it to make their homes. There is an interconnectedness. I myself use paper from school textbooks, reuse them to make papier-mâché,” he said.

The installation — a foot long and 16 feet wide —is made up of 80 individual pieces that once put together showcase a set of traditional homes in Ladakh, roofs, windows and all. “I have used materials like clay and cardboard apart from papier-mâché because I wanted the installation to also show the textures and colours of Ladakh, too,” he said.

“Tashi’s work takes the question of home to the level of community, raising awareness about how traditional domestic architecture in Ladakh is being displaced by modern building practice,” Jaffer said.

Ranjani Shettar: Under the Same Sky

Many of Shettar’s installations possess a gravity-defying aspect, a fact that she attributes to her father, an engineer, who would sometimes question the centre of gravity of a work in progress.

“My father would be quietly watching what I am doing, but once in a way he would comment, ‘The centre of gravity is outside your form, how can it hold up?’ and whenever he said that, I would say, my idea is to have this highly precarious positioning, I wanted the piece to almost take off from the ground or the pedestal it was upon. He would reply, ‘get your engineering right otherwise, you know, it’s not going to work.’ I think that’s what led me to explore and start suspending my sculptures. They were already on the edge that they simply could not stay on the platform anymore. They just took off. It was just inevitable.”

At the biennale, Shettar’s sculptural installation comprises intricately crafted, suspended forms inspired by flowers and natural growth. Made by hand using a special mix of woven cotton fabric and lacquer over a steel frame, Shettar has developed this material through careful experimentation over years. As a result, the works appear

weightless, forming a conceptual garden that visitors move through. Her practice reflects the rhythms of making and tending, positioning nature and craft as integral to the emotional landscape of home.

“I am inspired by nature, and as an artist, I wish to enjoy its beauty, and present it to my audience. The way I use space in my sculptures too is deliberate. It’s almost like an active ingredient of my works. I also like to make people move maybe unconsciously and respond to the movement that’s already in the sculpture. In a formal sense, it is important for me that people see the work from all around and that there is no such thing as the back of a sculpture,” Shettar said.

The work, made up of 74 parts, which when assembled together, became 52 independent pieces that needed to be suspended. It is also large in terms of scale: two feet off the ground, up to 20 feet high, and 27 feet wide

“Ranjani Shettar’s florally-inspired suspensions contributed an important element – that of the role of nature in the memory of home,” said Jaffer.

Alwar Balasubramaniam: Not Just For Us

Alwar Balasubramaniam, moved out of his city life and built his home and studio near Papanasam forest in Tamil Nadu. Bala, as the art world calls him, takes his time to produce his pieces. For him, it is far more significant to note and observe the small things that we don’t otherwise think about in the daily rush of existence.

His 10 ft by 18 ft work made up of dried earth, clay and resin on display at the national pavilion is a case in point. Bala’s initial plan was to make a piece along the lines of Drift, a 2022 piece that showed lines of cracked earth. Being a work of larger dimensions, Bala set about making the mould outside his studio, pouring earth mixed in water.

First the earthworms appeared. Then the shoots of tiny plants sprouted. This brought the chickens, and peacocks; a snake slithered by, a monkey dropped in — as the piece dried over the course of 75 days, creatures left their imprints over it. Even Bala’s year-old child inadvertently walked over the drying sculpture.

At first Bala was concerned –he had wanted to create an installation along the lines Drift, that would recall the traces that evaporated water leaves behind on drying earth. Later, he thought about how the piece came to have a life of its own. “It just made me think about how humans are so possessive about everything. We look at life in such a human-centric manner that even water sources drying up or air being unclean matters only because of its impact on us,” Bala said.

Jaffer drew a connection between Singh’s threadwork house and Bala’s dried earth sculpture, stating that while the former evoked the home, the latter evoked “the soil beneath our feet”.

Asim Waqif: Chaal

A trained architect from the School of Planning and Architecture (SPA) New Delhi, Waqif left the field to work as a filmmaker for some years. Today, the Delhi-based artist finds his work at the national pavilion after a successful showing of Chaal at the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre (NMACC) in Mumbai in 2024.

The work is a site-specific installation, which means that Waqif and his team had to create it specifically at the pavilion’s site in Venice. His team comprising eight artisans from West Bengal, and an architect from Manipur, and even a civil engineer who has an ease of working with bamboo got to work. Although the work entailed a good amount of improvisation, the process was fairly familiar, Waqif said. “I left a lot to the team. In fact, I went away for a while so that they would figure the piece out, and when I returned, I was heartless in editing stuff out from what they’d made,” Waqif said.

This type of decentralized working style has to come to define his practice, Waqif said. It applies not just to structural choices but also aesthetic ones, he said.

Although Waqif has been working with bamboo material for a few decades — “as a student, it was a versatile and cheap material” — he moved away to work with other materials like timber, waste metal among other things. In 2019, he even created a Durga idol for a local resident association’s pandal in Kolkata.

“Asim Waqif’s sculpture in bamboo – which evokes the scaffolding omnipresent in Indian cities – provides a dramatic counterpoint, signaling renewal and change,” Jaffer said. “The projects made for the Pavilion are site-specific, but are naturally grounded in the wider practice of the chosen artists,” he added.

Within the most recent 72 hours assembly electionsElection Commission of India (ECI) released detailed statistical reports and index cards ECINet CapabilitiesIts digital election platform formally launches in its full commercial version in January 2026 Special Intensive Review (SIR) for that west bengal electionsDespite all relevant information being readily available within ECINet, the ECI neither disclosed the status of approximately 34 lakh appeals, including seven lakh annulment appeals, pending before 19 Supreme Court-appointed tribunals, nor issued a comparable transparency report.

Reportedly, a tribunal headed by the former Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court disposed of 1,777 appeals, allowing all 1,717 civil appeals for inclusion and rejecting all 60 ECI appeals for deletion. Similar large-scale reforms may be in store for the other 18 jurisdictions. In contrast, the ECI had reportedly covered only about 1,607 voters before the poll.

Such selective disclosures and inconsistent transparency raise serious questions about the functioning of the ECI, neutrality and equally the suppression of important information that could potentially influence electoral outcomes.

Despite this, there is a lack of comparable transparency and status disclosure for SIR. Report of massive discrepancies And disenfranchisement raises serious questions about selective disclosure and institutional double standards within the ECI. As a constitutional authority, the ECI enjoys the highest institutional dignity and trust. Equally, it must remain accountable, transparent and open to objective scrutiny, especially when allegations of arbitrariness, bias and massive exclusion of genuine voters emerge.

In this backdrop, an independent AI-enabled inspection layer integrated with ECINet can continuously assess the electoral roll revision processes, including neutrality, consistency and procedural arbitrariness. The proposed AI watchdog framework is easy to implement, a basic operational model can be achieved within a few months and is capable of continuous enhancement thereafter.

Failures in SIR 2.0

SIR 2.0 exposed unprecedented chaos induced by ad-hoc, constantly changing and subjective SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures), which reportedly excluded millions of genuine voters from the electoral rolls and, in many cases, deprived them of candidature rights. What began as an exercise to improve electoral accuracy by removing ASDD (absent, transferred, duplicate, dead) entries and adding new voters instead, resulted in widespread uncertainty, repeated verifications, lengthy appeals, and allegations of arbitrariness, discrimination and bias.

The exercise relied heavily on the inaccurate, incomplete and non-searchable legacy SIR 2002-04 database. Instead of correcting flaws at the source, the burden of proof was placed on voters, forcing genuine citizens to establish their eligibility again and again despite long voting histories and valid documents. This process was marked by uneven application of logical discrepancy criteria across regions and voter groups, resulting in non-uniform outcomes for similarly situated voters. Minor mismatches in name, age or family details often lead to exclusion, while opaque decision-making and the absence of rational orders have led to allegations of arbitrariness and algorithmic bias.

The results were most worrying in West Bengal, where only 1,600 inclusion appeals and only six deletion cases out of approximately 3.4 million pending appeals were disposed of before the vote, even though the success rate of inclusion appeals was reportedly over 99%. Election officials and prospective candidates were reportedly among those excluded. Notably, one such excluded person, who was later cleared for inclusion, was elected as an MLA.

In an unprecedented situation, the victory margin in 49 assembly constituencies was reportedly less than the number of voters awaiting disposal of inclusion appeals. The top court said relief for many may come only in future elections and post-poll scrutiny may be necessary in constituencies where the margin of victory is less than the scale of anomalies and pending appeals, raising serious concerns over electoral integrity and the possibility of post-poll chaos. This situation reflects not only administrative failure but also a deep crisis of credibility in the electoral roll revision process.

These developments exposed deep structural weaknesses in voter list management. They stood in contrast to the Election Commission’s repeated commitment to “ensure free, fair, transparent, accessible and peaceful elections” and its assurance that “no genuine voter is disenfranchised.”

More importantly, this happened despite ECINet reportedly being able to handle three crore hits per minute and maintaining detailed operational data for every voter and transaction. Yet neutrality, consistency and accountability remained largely dependent on opaque manual processes, administrative discretion and ex post facto corrections. Therefore, the SIR 2.0 experience underlined the urgent need for a sustainable, technology-driven oversight mechanism capable of monitoring processes, detecting anomalies, assessing institutional neutrality, and identifying discriminatory patterns in real time.

AI Inspection for ECINet

As AI is increasingly powering governance and large-scale public systems, election management also requires intelligent, continuous auditable oversight. Incorporating an AI-enabled watchdog within ECINet provides a practical path to creating a neutrality-aware voter list management system capable of protecting democratic participation and public trust.

Directly integrated with ECINet, the proposed AI layer will act as a continuous monitoring and analysis engine. It will monitor usage of the system, track decision patterns, analyze voter-official interactions and generate real-time indicators of neutrality, consistency, efficiency and citizen satisfaction at the booth, constituency, district and state levels. Unlike ex post reviews, it can continuously audit electoral roll revision processes using transactional and procedural data already available within ECINet, allowing irregularities to be detected early, before they escalate into large-scale disenfranchisement or administrative crises.

The system can automatically flag anomalies and discriminatory patterns, including abnormal increase in deletions, inconsistent application of SOPs, trend of repeated rejections linked to specific authorities, excessive complaint delays, sudden policy changes, bias arising from logical anomaly filters, disproportionate exclusions due to minor spelling or family-data mismatches, and concentrated deletions in specific areas, castes or communities. It can also compare results across regions to identify differential treatment with similarly placed voters and enforce consistency in institutional communications by tracking announcements, circulars, deadlines, SOP amendments, and field instructions.

Furthermore, ongoing analysis of bottlenecks, software glitches, validation failures, complaint trends, and operational inefficiencies can support evidence-based refinement of SOPs, replacing ad-hoc administrative responses with measurable corrective action. A basic operational version of such an AI watchdog could be implemented within a few months and then continuously scaled up.

way forward

An AI-enabled watchdog integrated with ECINet can continuously monitor electoral operations, assess institutional neutrality, detect anomalies and discriminatory patterns, and flag anomalies or changes in eligibility criteria.

It can standardize declarations, timelines and procedural updates, reducing confusion and non-uniform implementation across regions.

With ECINet already fully operational, AI-powered inspection can make SIR processes more transparent, neutral, accountable and citizen-centric. Importantly, such a system would strengthen – not replace – constitutional authority through transparent audit trails, fairness metrics, evidence-based oversight and measurable accountability, while reducing arbitrariness, ambiguity and public distrust.

(Rajeev Kumar is a former Professor of Computer Science at IIT Kharagpur, IIT Kanpur, BITS Pilani and JNU and a former scientist of DRDO and DST)

Flexible Storage: The biggest advantage of using a convertible refrigerator is that it lets you instantly expand the capacity of your fridge by converting the freezer section. This gives you extra storage space when you need it.

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So, if you’re planning to upgrade your refrigerator to a model that offers you more flexibility, here are our top picks for you.

5 best convertible refrigerators for Indian homes this summer

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This refrigerator from Godrej is designed for large Indian families of five or more people. It features a premium inox finish and sleek flat-door that is designed to give the look of a modern, high-class kitchen. This refrigerator gets a convertible mode that lets users repurpose the freezer space into fridge storage for added flexibility. It is powered by an inverter compressor, which optimizes cooling while reducing energy consumption. Additionally, it comes with an advanced multi air flow technology, which ensures uniform cooling in both the compartments, and frost-free operation feature that adds everyday convenience for users seeking hassle-free maintenance.

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This Samsung refrigerator is ideal for families with three to four members. It has a stunning inox finish and sleek recessed-handle design that adds a premium look to contemporary kitchens. It comes with a 5-in-1 convertible mode that lets users convert the freezer space into additional fridge space depending on their needs. It is powered by a digital inverter compressor that optimizes energy consumption while ensuring quiet operation. It comes with Samsung’s Twin Cooling Plus technology that cools the fridge and freezer, maintaining freshness for longer periods and preventing odors from spreading across all compartments.

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Top 3 features of convertible refrigerators for Indian homes this summer

Disclaimer: At Hindustan Times, we help you stay updated with the latest trends and products. Hindustan Times has an affiliate partnership, so we may get a share of the revenue when you make a purchase. We will not be liable for any claims under applicable laws including but not limited to the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 in relation to the Products. The products listed in this article are in no particular order of priority.

Last Updated:May 11, 2026, 14:33 IST

Despite moving from a modest Gujarat Housing Board home in Jamnagar’s Ranjitnagar area to the grand Bungalow No. 10 on Akbar Road, Tushar Mehta remains humble and grounded

Over the past eight years, Tushar Mehta has left a deep impact as India’s Solicitor General. He is known not only for strongly representing the Modi government in the country’s highest court, but also for his calm demeanour, humility, and his ability to present facts in a refined and effective manner.

On Sunday evening, two books authored by Tushar Mehta were formally launched at Bharat Mandapam in Delhi. The event was chaired by Chief Justice of India Justice Surya Kant, while Union Home and Cooperation Minister Amit Shah was the chief guest.

The occasion was attended not only by Mehta’s family members, but also by Amit Shah’s wife Sonalben and daughter-in-law Rishita. Shah spoke about his relationship with Tushar Mehta. He also mentioned Mehta’s mother, to whom both the books have been dedicated. In the dedication, Mehta writes that his mother’s struggles and sacrifices played a major role in helping him reach where he is today.

Naturally, there could hardly have been a better day than Mother’s Day for the launch of the two books. Despite it being a Sunday evening, the event saw the presence of many distinguished personalities not only from the legal fraternity but also from other sections of society. Along with Supreme Court judges, several Chief Justices from different states, other judges, and senior advocates gathered at Hall No. 2 of Bharat Mandapam.

The stage represented a rare coming together of both the judiciary and the executive. However, Shah made it clear at the outset that he would not speak about issues concerning these institutions at the event. He said there would be other forums for such discussions, and that he was there solely to celebrate and discuss his friend Tushar Mehta’s books.

And that is exactly what he did — spending most of his speech talking about Mehta and his writings. Attorney General R. Venkataramani did the same. Having thoroughly read the books, he elaborated on their many aspects one after another, almost in the style of presenting arguments in court after preparing for an important case.

Chief Justice Surya Kant wholeheartedly praised Tushar Mehta for authoring both books, while also teasing him for not including stories from Indian courts. The Chief Justice suggested that Mehta’s third book should focus on interesting anecdotes from the Indian judiciary. He even narrated several amusing courtroom stories that could inspire such a future book.

THE TWO BOOKS

The two books written by Mehta are titled ‘The Bench, the Bar and the Bizarre’ and ‘The Lawful and the Awful’. As the titles suggest, these are not conventional law books. Instead, they take an unconventional approach, offering candid observations on the judiciary and legal system. Most of the stories featured in the books are drawn from foreign courts, particularly American courtrooms.

These books describe how some judges begin to see themselves as almost god-like figures, while also portraying the struggles, helplessness, and dilemmas faced by lawyers, litigants, and even judges themselves. The books contain many fascinating anecdotes ranging from district courts to the Supreme Court.

Mehta himself explained in a light-hearted manner why he chose not to centre the books around the Indian judicial system and Indian courts. He said that he still has many years of legal practice ahead of him, which is why he avoided directly discussing Indian courtrooms.

Another reason, he explained, was that through these stories he wanted to show that courts and judgments in other countries are not necessarily better than India’s judicial system, contrary to what many people believe. However, after the suggestion made by Chief Justice Justice Surya Kant, many people present in the packed hall felt that Mehta may come out with a third book with stories of Indian courts.

Usually, when a prominent lawyer or judge writes a book, it is either an autobiography or a detailed account of famous legal battles, constitutional questions, and related issues. But Tushar Mehta chose a different path. With candour and wit, he raised issues and narrates stories that both amuse readers and provoke questions about the judicial system. That is what makes both books unconventional.

MEHTA’S JOURNEY

In fact, Mehta’s own life journey has also been unconventional. Tushar Mehta is the longest-serving Solicitor General of India after CK Daphtary. Yet, he does not come from any major legal dynasty. It is often believed that belonging to a family of lawyers is advantageous for reaching the top in the legal profession, but Mehta is the first lawyer in his family.

His early education did not take place in major metropolitan cities like Mumbai or Delhi, but in the city of Jamnagar in Gujarat. The city was once known mainly for famous cricketers like Ranjitsinhji and Duleepsinhji, and today is recognized as an important industrial and strategic hub. It was in Jamnagar that Tushar Mehta spent his childhood.

Born on September 11, 1964, Mehta lost his father at a very young age. Just a few days before his matriculation examinations were to begin, his father — who worked as a Mamlatdar in the Gujarat government — died in an accident. Despite this tragedy, Mehta did not abandon his exams. He continued his studies while silently carrying the grief of losing his father.

Mehta completed his higher secondary education in science from DCC High School in Jamnagar. At the time, he aspired to become an engineer. His dream was to contribute to the speedy completion of the long-delayed Sardar Sarovar Dam on the Narmada River, which had long been seen as a major hope for solving the water crisis in the Saurashtra region.

But fate had different plans for him. After his father’s death, the family faced severe financial difficulties. Mehta himself mentions this in his book. He writes that after his father passed away when he was only thirteen, his widowed mother sold her jewelry to fund his education and ensure he could continue his studies.

Despite these financial challenges, Mehta completed his Class 12 education. However, despite extensive preparation and hard work, he was unable to secure admission to a reputed engineering college. As a result, he decided to pursue a B.Sc. degree from DKV Arts and Science College in Jamnagar.

After completing his B.Sc. in 1983, Mehta moved to Ahmedabad, the largest city in Gujarat. At one point, he considered preparing for the UPSC examination and joining the civil services, especially since his father had served in the Gujarat government’s administrative system. But soon afterward, he decided to make law his profession.

Tushar Mehta enrolled at the renowned Sir L. A. Shah Law College in Ahmedabad and also lived in its hostel. It was considered one of the most prestigious law colleges in western India. Established on June 20, 1927, by the Gujarat Law Society, it was the fourth-oldest law college affiliated with the University of Bombay.

The law college became part of the Gujarat University, which was established in 1949, in 1950.

The institution produced two Chief Justices of India — Justice J. C. Shah and Justice A. M. Ahmadi — along with numerous Supreme Court and High Court judges.

After gaining admission to this highly accomplished institution, Tushar Mehta devoted himself wholeheartedly to his LL.B. studies. As a result, he earned not one but five gold medals during his law degree. Three of these medals were awarded by Gujarat University, while two came from the Gujarat Law Society. Two medals were named after Justice N. G. Shelat and Nani Palkhivala.

After completing his LL.B. with distinction, Tushar Mehta registered as an advocate with the Gujarat Bar Council on March 9, 1987, obtaining his legal license. He then began practicing law at the Gujarat High Court. In his early years, he worked as a junior under noted lawyer Krishnakant Vakharia. After some time, Mehta started his independent legal practice.

TUSHAR MEHTA, AMIT SHAH AND NARENDRA MODI

Over the next one-and-a-half decades, Tushar Mehta built expertise in matters related to cooperative societies, municipal corporations, panchayats, and electricity disputes. Through this work, he developed deep connections within Gujarat’s cooperative sector. One of the people he came to know during this period was Amit Shah, who was first elected as a BJP MLA from Ahmedabad’s Sarkhej constituency in 1997. Before that, Shah had served as chairman of the Gujarat State Finance Corporation in 1995-96, and in 2000 became president of the Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank, the country’s largest district cooperative bank.

When Amit Shah took charge of the Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank, Gujarat’s cooperative sector was largely dominated by the Congress party — from dairy cooperatives to cooperative banks. Both the then Chief Minister Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, who became Gujarat’s Minister of State for Home in 2002, clearly understood that the cooperative sector could serve as a powerful means of connecting with ordinary citizens and addressing their problems. Consequently, the BJP rapidly strengthened its hold in this sector, gradually displacing Congress from numerous cooperative institutions.

During this phase, Tushar Mehta helped Amit Shah in legal battles and tangles. Over time, the two grew increasingly close.

Having already established a strong reputation as a lawyer, Tushar Mehta was designated a Senior Advocate of the Gujarat High Court on August 14, 2008. Later that same year, on December 16, he was appointed Additional Advocate General of Gujarat. At the time of his appointment, Gujarat’s Law Minister was Amit Shah, who was already an admirer and close associate of Mehta.

In this new role, Tushar Mehta strongly defended the Gujarat government against numerous legal challenges. It was a period when dozens of cases related to the Gujarat riots were being heard from lower courts all the way up to the Supreme Court. Simultaneously, cases involving alleged terrorists and criminals killed in police encounters were also drawing widespread attention, with investigations ranging from SIT probes to judicial inquiries.

At that time, the opposition was aggressively targeting the Gujarat government over these matters. In Gujarat, the Congress party was attacking the Modi government, while at the national level the Congress-led UPA government was leaving no opportunity to politically corner Narendra Modi and Amit Shah.

Tushar Mehta played a major role in helping Narendra Modi and Amit Shah confront these legal challenges. By then, Mehta had already spent more than two decades practicing law in the Gujarat High Court. Yet he never hesitated to appear in lower courts or repeatedly travel to Delhi to argue cases before the Supreme Court.

Not only did he personally appear in court and argue cases, but he also comfortably coordinated with eminent legal experts like Ram Jethmalani, explaining every detail of complex matters with ease. From the very beginning of his legal career, Mehta had developed the habit of studying every case in great depth and examining all its dimensions. As a result, he was always thoroughly prepared and had complete command over the facts of any case he handled.

Then came the period when the CBI, allegedly under pressure from the then UPA government, filed a chargesheet against Amit Shah in the Sohrabuddin encounter case. As a result, Shah was forced to resign from the Modi cabinet and surrender before the CBI in July 2010. During this difficult legal battle, Tushar Mehta stood firmly beside Amit Shah. Soon afterward, Shah secured bail from the Gujarat High Court. Over the following years, Mehta successfully fought several encounter-related cases, eventually helping not only Amit Shah but also several Gujarat police officers — who had spent long periods in jail — obtain relief and acquittals.

Not only that, Mehta also represented the Gujarat government in all major cases related to the 2002 Gujarat riots. In the Godhra case, he succeeded in securing severe punishment for many of the accused. It is important to note that criminal law was never Tushar Mehta’s first preference as a lawyer, but he mastered it whenever circumstances required.

This was one of the reasons why Mehta grew increasingly close not only to Amit Shah but also to Narendra Modi. When the first BJP government with a full majority at the Centre came to power under Narendra Modi in May 2014, Tushar Mehta was appointed Additional Solicitor General of India within a month. The official notification for his appointment was issued on June 7, 2014. Thus, after serving continuously for six years as Gujarat’s Additional Advocate General, he moved to the national stage as Additional Solicitor General of India.

After successfully serving in that role for four years, Mehta became the Solicitor General of India on October 10, 2018. Since then, he has remained in the post continuously, earning widespread recognition for his sharp arguments and deep legal knowledge. He appears before the Supreme Court on behalf of the Government of India in almost every major and significant case, and has achieved success in many of them.

THE DAY ARTICLE 370 WAS REVOKED

Although Mehta generally stayed away from media attention, many people first took serious notice of him in 2019, when the Modi government decided to revoke Article 370 from Jammu and Kashmir in August. The move had been kept completely confidential, and Tushar Mehta was quietly handling the legal preparations under the guidance of Modi and Amit Shah — from drafting the legislation to preparing the government’s defense in the Supreme Court in anticipation of legal challenges.

On the day Amit Shah introduced the bill in the Rajya Sabha, Mehta reportedly spent the entire previous night working in a room inside Parliament House itself. Only much later did people come to know about the important role he had played.

As Supreme Court proceedings gradually began to be webcast, Tushar Mehta’s sharp courtroom arguments frequently went viral. From ordinary citizens to legal experts, many became admirers of his advocacy skills. Mehta consistently presented his arguments with logic, clarity, and confidence. This was noticed not only in legal circles but also among the general public, further strengthening his reputation.

However, when Mehta first arrived in Delhi in 2014 as Additional Solicitor General, the city was still unfamiliar territory for him. Very few people in Delhi’s legal circles knew him at the time. But over the past twelve years, he has firmly established himself. Judges listen carefully to his submissions, and fellow lawyers admire his abilities. Even those lawyers who once criticized him privately, or judges who occasionally reprimanded him in court, have changed their views and come to acknowledge that Tushar Mehta possesses something exceptional.

As for Tushar Mehta himself, success has not altered his personality. Despite moving from a modest Gujarat Housing Board home in Jamnagar’s Ranjitnagar area to the grand Bungalow No. 10 on Akbar Road in Delhi’s Lutyens’ Zone, he remains humble and grounded. He carries no arrogance about his influence or fame.

He has now served as Solicitor General of India for eight years — the longest such tenure since C. K. Daphtary, who served as the country’s first Solicitor General from 1950 to 1963 and later as Attorney General from 1963 to 1968. It would not be surprising if Tushar Mehta eventually surpasses Daphtary’s record.

Yet despite all these remarkable achievements, Tushar Mehta shows no sign of arrogance. Even today, he remains approachable and simple in manner, continues to enjoy poetry and Urdu couplets, maintains deep respect for his seniors, and possesses the patience and resilience needed to overcome difficult circumstances and challenges.

That, perhaps, is the real reason he has achieved such an extraordinary position in India’s legal world — something that became clearly visible to everyone present on Sunday evening.

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