• Source:JND
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The Central government on Thursday initiated the process of appointment of the next Chief Justice of India (CJI) as incumbent BR Gavai will demit the office on November 23, news agency PTI reported.

The letter asking CJI Gavai to name his successor was set to be delivered either this evening or on Friday, PTI reported, based on the account of people aware of the procedure to appoint Supreme Court and high court judges.

According to the memorandum of procedure for the appointments, a set of documents which guide the appointment, transfer and elevation of Supreme Court and High Court judges, states that appointment to the office of the CJI should be of the senior-most judge of the apex court considered fit to hold the office.

The Union law minister would, at the appropriate time, seek the outgoing CJI's recommendation for the appointment of his successor.

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As per the convention, the letter seeking recommendation is sent a month before the incumbent CJI is to retire upon attaining the age of 65 years.

Who is Justice Surya Kant? 

At present, Justice Surya Kant is next in line and the senior-most judge after CJI Gavai. Born in Hisar's middle-class family on February 10, 1962, Justice Surya Kant became a apex court judge on May 24, 2019.

As his retirement date is February 9, 2027, he would hold the top position for 15 months once appointed. Justice Surya Kant brings to the country's top judicial office a wealth of experience spanning two decades on the Bench, marked by landmark verdicts on abrogation of Article 370, free speech, democracy, corruption, environment and gender equality.

He was part of the historic bench that kept the colonial-era sedition law in abeyance, directing that no new FIRs be registered under it until a government review.

In the latest controversy around the deletion of voters in Bihar, he nudged the Election Commission to disclose details of 65 lakh excluded voters in Bihar.

In another historic direction, he asked that one-third of seats in bar associations, including the Supreme Court Bar Association, be reserved for women.

Among many other high-profile cases, he was also a part of the bench that appointed a five-member committee headed by former SC judge Indu Malhotra to probe the security breach during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 2022 Punjab visit, saying such matters required 'a judicially trained mind.' 

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He upheld the One Rank-One Pension (OROP) scheme for defence forces, calling it constitutionally valid. He was on the seven-judge bench that overruled the 1967 Aligarh Muslim University judgment, opening the way for reconsideration of the institution's minority status.

Pegasus spyware case was also heard by a bench with Justice Surya Kant as a member. The bench had appointed a panel of cyber experts to probe allegations of unlawful surveillance, famously stating that the state cannot get a 'free pass under the guise of national security.'

(With PTI Inputs)

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