Arun Nehru, a cousin of Rajiv Gandhi and Minister for Internal Security in his government, died in a hospital in Gurgaon.

The former Union Minister, Arun Nehru, who passed away in Gurgaon on Thursday, had a successful career in the corporate world before joining politics in the early 1980s.

When Rajiv Gandhi became Prime Minister in 1984, he was his close adviser and Minister of State for Internal Security. However, he fell out with Rajiv later.

Mr. Nehru was accused by the CBI of causing a loss to the exchequer in a pistol deal with Czechoslovakia in 1988 during his tenure as Minister of State. The Supreme Court recently stayed the proceedings in the case.

Mr. Nehru moved out of the family home in Allahabad at an early age and studied at the La Martinere Boys College in Lucknow.

At the age of 20, he began his career in the corporate world, which he gave up 17 years later when Indira Gandhi asked him to join politics. Mr. Nehru was then the president of the Jenson and Nicholson group of companies.

Mr. Nehru, 69, a cousin of Rajiv Gandhi and Minister for Internal Security in his government, died in a Gurgaon hospital, according to family sources. The funeral will take place at the Lodhi crematorium in New Delhi on Friday.