Justice must protect last citizen, only then does it belong to all: Justice Kant

“Let justice protect the last citizen, for only then does it truly belong to all,” CJI Surya Kant asserted soon after taking oath on Monday.

Justice Kant said the authority of courts flowed not from tradition or ceremony, but from the everyday trust of ordinary people. The CJI said justice must feel real in the lives of citizens — accessible, unbiased and humane. If the law failed to reach everyone, he said, justice would lose its meaning.

“Justice is not a privilege for a few — it is a guarantee for all, or it ceases to be justice,” he said. Judicial independence, Justice Kant said, would remain non-negotiable. Calling it “the armour of the Republic”, the CJI said this constitutional promise protected citizens from the excesses of power.

The Constitution, he said, was the moral compass of the nation and must continue to guide judicial interpretation even as society evolved.

Identifying delay as one of the deepest wounds of justice, Justice Kant said the system must work with urgency without losing compassion. “A case may rest in a file, but justice cannot be allowed to rest — not even for a moment,” he said, adding that efficiency must never come at the cost of empathy or access.

On mediation, Justice Kant maintained that consensual resolutions should not be mistaken for compromise, describing it as justice without prolonged conflict. “Every judgment that resolves a legal doubt frees a thousand lives from uncertainty,” he said, emphasising that decisions which settle lives must be prioritised over litigation that merely extends conflict.

Asserting that the judiciary fulfilled its duty only when the law stood beside the ordinary citizen rather than above him, Justice Kant said: “When the last person in the queue feels protected by the law, only then can the judiciary say it has served the nation.”