Dar started his political career in early 1980s and since then he has been elected to the National Assembly of Pakistan twice for Lahore and to the Senate thrice. He hold his first public office as the Chairman of Pakistan Board of Investment for a year during the first government of Nawaz Sharif. After the PML-N victory in the 1997 general election, he held the cabinet portfolios of Minister for Commerce, Minister for Industries and Investment and Minister for Finance, until the 1999 coup. He remained in jail for two years over corruption charges.