Centre initiates process to appoint new CJI; Justice Surya Kant next in line

With barely a month left for the retirement of Chief Justice of India B R Gavai, the Centre on Thursday initiated the process for appointment of his successor.

The Government has formally written to CJI Gavai – who is due to retire on November 23 on attaining the age of 65 – to name his successor, sources said.

According to the memorandum of procedure on the appointment and transfer of Supreme Court and High Court judges, the senior-most judge of the Supreme Court considered fit to hold the office should be appointed as the CJI.

CJI Gavai is expected to recommend Justice Surya Kant – the senior-most judge of the Supreme Court -- as his successor.

Born in a middle-class family on February 10, 1962 in Hisar district of Haryana, he obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Law in 1984 from Maharishi Dayanand University, Rohtak, and earned the distinction of being appointed the youngest Advocate General of Haryana on July 7, 2000 at the age of 38. He was appointed a Judge to the Punjab and Haryana High Court on January 9, 2004 and assumed charge of the office of the Chief Justice of the High Court of Himachal Pradesh on October 5, 2018.

Justice Surya Kant was elevated as judge of the Supreme Court on May 24, 2019. Once appointed, Justice Kant will become the 53rd CJI on November 24, 2025 and hold the office for nearly 15 months till February 9, 2027.

There has been a convention of the CJI recommending the senior-most judge of the Supreme Court as his successor.

Only twice, it was not followed – Justice AN Ray was appointed the CJI on April 25, 1973 superseding three senior-most judges and Justice MH Beg was appointed the CJI on January 29, 1977 superseding Justice HR Khanna.

Justice Kant brings 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, until the government reviewed it.

Justice Kant headed the Bench which asked the Election Commission to disclose details of 65 lakh excluded voters in Bihar in the Special Intensive Revision of Electoral Rolls in Bihar. He also directed that one-third of seats in bar associations, including the Supreme Court Bar Association, be reserved for women.

He headed the Bench that dealt with farmers’ blockade of Shambhu Border near Ambala.

Justice Surya Kant was part of the Bench that appointed a five-member committee headed by former Supreme Court judge Justice Indu Malhotra to probe the security breach during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 2022 Punjab visit. He upheld the One Rank-One Pension (OROP) scheme for defence forces, calling it constitutionally valid.

He was on the Bench that heard the Pegasus spyware case, which 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”. He also was on the seven-judge Bench that overruled a 1967 ruling that had denied minority status to the Aligarh Muslim University.