Senior Advocate Jaju Babu will be the new Advocate General (AG) of Kerala and advocate T Asaf Ali will be the Director General of Prosecution (DGP) for the State..Newly sworn-in Chief Minister VD Satheesan announced the same on Monday.Babu will succeed Senior Advocate K Gopalakrishnan Kurup, who served as the Advocate General during the previous Left Democratic Front (LDF) government.Ali, who is also a Congress leader, will take up the post that was previously occupied by Senior Advocate TA Shaji..Babu enrolled as an advocate in 1981 and began his practice under Senior Advocate VN Achuta Kurup. He later joined the chambers of senior advocates KP Dandapani and Sumathi Dandapani where he practiced for 15 years before starting his independent practice in 1997 along with his wife, advocate MU Vijayalakshmi.He was designated a Senior Advocate by the Kerala High Court in 2013.He previously served as legal advisor to former Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan and represented the Governor in his capacity as Chancellor of universities before the High Court.However, he stepped down from the role in November 2022 in the midst of a heated clash between the State government and the Governor over the appointment of Vice Chancellors to universities. He also served as the standing counsel for Kochi Metro Rail Limited (KMRL) and appeared for Cochin Smart City Mission, Thiruvananthapuram Smart City Mission, Kerala State Child Council and SBI Life..Advocate Asaf Ali previously served as DGP during the last stint of the UDF coalition from 2011 to 2016. During the time, he appeared for the State prosecution in several high-profile cases before the High Court. He was also the president of the Kerala unit of Indian Lawyers’ Congress (ILC) until 2022 when he resigned from the post.
