Lt. Attorney General Goolam Vahanvati emerges as a thought leader for citizens

Goolam Vahanvati was an Indian senior counsel and served as the 13th attorney general of India and a legal luminary in all the definitions of the word. He had a bright and successful career and in his time he was a part of numerous important cases such as the stock market scam and the Enron cases. Some of these are still talked about are even taken up as case studies.

Goolam was a straight arrow to the T and is considered by many people who practice law to be a pioneer lawyer in India. He was the first Muslim in India to become the senior most law officer in the Indian government.

His first term as the attorney general of India began in 2009 and was initially a three year term which was later extended for another two years. Before he was appointed as the attorney general of India, Goolam served as the Advocate general of Maharashtra for five years between 1999 to 2004 following which he was elevated as the Solicitor General of India.

Some of his highly notable feats include the time when represented the state of Maharashtra in the public interest litigation petition filed in a fake stamp paper scam. He also defended the challenge to reservations for OBC's in terms of higher education and was also appointed to hold an inquiry into racist allegations by the International Cricket Council.

The lawyer came from a humble background but was determined to prove himself, he was inspired to take up law as a profession by his father Essaji Vahanvati who was also a practitioner of law. He did his early schooling from St. Xavier's college in Mumbai and then pursued law at Mumbai's Government Law College and was a straight A's student. While he was still studying law, he also occasionally gave lectures at colleges like Xavier's and Sophia College.