Justice Surya Kant Sworn In As CJI Amid High Pendency In Supreme Court

Justice Kant will have a relatively longer tenure of nearly 15 months, demitting office on February 9, 2027, after he turns 65 years.

Taking over the top Judicial position at a time when the Supreme Court faces nearly 90,000 pending cases, he faces the foremost challenge of reducing the pendency rate. He will also be presiding over cases related to key Constitutional issues.  

Who Is Justice Surya Kant

Justice Kant was born in Haryana's Hisar on February 10, 1962. He graduated from the Government Post Graduate College, Hisar, in 1981. He completed his bachelor's degree in law from Maharishi Dayanand University, Rohtak, in 1984.

He started practising law at the district court in Hisar in 1984, and later shifted to Chandigarh in 1985 to practise in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, becoming the youngest Advocate General of Haryana in 2000.

He was appointed the Chief Justice of the Himachal Pradesh High Court in 2018. Justice Kant was elevated as a Supreme Court judge in 2019, and has been part of key verdicts, including the recent Presidential reference on the powers of the Governor and the President in dealing with bills passed by a State assembly.

Major Cases And Interventions

He has also been associated with a series of significant Constitutional rulings. He was part of the Supreme Court Bench that upheld the abrogation of Article 370 and kept the colonial-era sedition law in abeyance by directing that no new FIRs be filed. 

Justice Kant had directed the Election Commission to disclose the names of 65 lakh voters excluded from Bihar’s draft rolls. He was also on the Bench that appointed a Committee led by Justice Indu Malhotra to probe the security breach during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Punjab in 2022. He upheld the "One Rank, One Pension" scheme.

He also served on the Bench handling the Pegasus spyware case.