How does the press manage to come out with the controversial bits in the cabinet meeting? - Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed

The son of an army doctor from Assam, he was educated in India and studied history at the University of Cambridge, graduating in 1927. After returning to India, he was elected to the Assam legislature (1935). As Assam’s minister of finance and revenue in 1938, he was responsible for some radical taxation measures. On the outbreak of World War II in 1939, the Indian National Congress party had a confrontation with British power, and he was jailed for a year. Soon after release he was again imprisoned for another three and a half years, being released in April 1945. In 1946 he was appointed advocate general of Assam and held the post for six years.

Elegantly dressed he was always courteous but firm in what he believed to be just and fair and presented himself as a Moghul, as it were, which quality he possibly inherited from his maternal side.

He was a man with modest habits, he was fond of light music, he had neither smoked nor even took ‘pan’ but he was fond of good dress.