NEW DELHI: BJP stalwart Arun Jaitley, who breathed his last after a prolonged illness on Friday, twice held charge of the critical defence ministry.
His first term spanned from 26 to November 9 of 2014 before he was succeeded by fellow saffron giant and former Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar.
He was briefly handed charge of the ministry on March 14, 2017, after Parrikar returned to Goa as the chief minister.
He was finally succeeded in the ministry by Nirmala Sitharaman on September 7, 2017.
During his two stints in the ministry of defence, Jaitley took several critical decisions that were aimed at bringing reforms to the ministry and simplify the process of purchasing military hardware.
It was on his watch that the Strategic Partnership (SP) Model was cleared in May 2017.
As part of this policy, select private Indian firms were allowed to join hands with foreign entities to build submarines, fighter jets, helicopters and armoured vehicles/main battle tanks in the country.
In August 2017, he cleared 65 reform measures aimed at turning the Army into a mean fighting unit.
It included the redeployment of nearly 57,000 officers and personnel of other ranks.
The reforms included optimisation of signal establishments, closure of military farms and army postal wing in peace locations, as well as restructuring of repair echelons, including base workshops.