Chief Justice of India UU Lalit was felicitated by the High Court Bar Association of Nagpur on Satirday. While delivering a speech at the ceremony, Justice Lalit was teary eyed as he recalled his time as a lawyer in Nagpur at the start of his career.
“I have been very fortunate that I come from a family of lawyers,” the CJI said of his ancestors. My grandfather began in the Solapur district in 1920. It has been 102 years of continuous change. “I think I’m the happiest person alive because my next generation is still practising law.”
Stating that he was feeling nostalgic while speaking in Nagpur where he started his journey, the CJI referred to a poem by Rudyard Kipling and said, “Life is a journey you undertake and it makes one emotional that it is not what you have covered but it is how you cover that.”
Between a few sniffles he continued, “I had the blessings of elders, the love of everybody around me, my friends, my colleagues, at the bar or even in normal walks of life. They have provided me strength.” The CJI also thanked his wife for standing by him like a “rock of Gibraltar” and said they shared a unique bond where she would understand him even before he said anything.
Justice Lalit took charge as the CJI on August 27. The Call will be felicitated at Dr Vasantrao Deshpande Hall in Civil Lines at 6:30pm. Supreme Court Judge Justice Bhusan R Gaval will be attending the function as the chief quest.
Chief Justice, Bombay High Court Justice Dipankar Datta and former Judge of the top court Justice Vikas S Sirpurkar, too, will be the guests of honour on this occasion. Justice Sunil B Shukre, Justice Atul S Chandurkar and former Chief Justice, Bombay High Court Bhushan P Dharmadhikari will also be present in the event.
Justice Lalit was a renowned senior advocate before he became the judge of the apex court. He was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court on August 13, 2014.
Justice Lalit will be the second CJI who was directly elevated to the Supreme Court bench from the Bar
Justice S M Sikri, who became the 13th CJI in January 1971, was the first lawyer to be elevated directly to the top court bench in March 1964.
Justice Lalit was born on November 9, 1957, in Maharashtra’s Solapur.
His father, U R Lalit, was an additional judge at the Nagpur bench of the Bombay high court and a senior advocate at the Supreme Court.
Justice Lalit enrolled as an advocate in June 1983. He specilised in criminal law and practiced at the Bombay High Court from 1983 to 1985.
He shifted his practice to Delhi in January 1986, and in April 2004, he was designated as a senior advocate by the top court.
He was later appointed a special public prosecutor for the CBI to conduct the trial in the 2G spectrum allocation case.
After Justice Lalit’s retirement on November 8, Justice D Y Chandrachud is scheduled to be appointed as the 50th Chief Justice of India.
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