Justice UU Lalit set to take oath as the 49th Chief Justice of India at Rashtrapati Bhavan

Justice Uday Umesh Lalit, who was appointed as the 49th Chief Justice of India with President Droupadi Murmu signing his warrant of appointment, will assume charge of the office on 27 August. 

Justice Lalit will have a brief tenure as the head of India’s judiciary and would demit office on November 8 after holding the charge as the CJI for nearly three months. As per the Indian Constitution, President Draupadi Murmu will be administering the oath to the 49th CJI, Justice UU Lalit later during the day.

Justice Lalit will be the second CJI who was directly elevated to the apex court bench from the Bar. Earlier, 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.

Speaking at the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) farewell event for outgoing CJI NV Ramana, Justice Uday Umesh Lalit listed priorities for his tenure and said he will strive to have at least one Constitution Bench functioning throughout the year, make the listings of cases as simple, clear and transparent as possible. He also said that there will be a clear-cut regime where any urgent matters can be freely mentioned before respective courts. 

Justice Lalit wants to work in three areas 

Justice Lalit on Friday said, "Let me place some parts I intend to do in my next innings of 74 days- three areas: I had a word of office with SCBA and SCORA earlier in the day. One and this is where we need to take cue from CJI Ramana and carry forward. One area is listing and I must assure you that we will strive hard to make the listing as simple, as clear, and as transparent as possible."

“Number two is the area which is mentioned as an urgent matter, I will certainly look into. I will have to work with all my colleagues at the bench and will certainly seek that out and very shortly you will have a clear regime where any urgent matters can freely be mentioned before respective courts,” he added. 

The senior advocate highlighted the listing of matters before the Constitution benches and matters which are especially referred to as benches of three judges as the third area. 

“I have always believed that the role of the Supreme Court is to lay down law with clarity, and consistency and the best way to do it is to have larger benches as early as possible where the matter is registered to such benches so that issues get clarified immediately, the matter has consistency and people are well aware of what are contours of peculiar positions of law. We will strive hard to always have at least one Constitution Bench functioning all throughout the year,” he added.

Justice Lalit's landmark judgments

Justice Lalit has been part of several landmark judgments including the one which held the practice of divorce through instant Triple Talaq among Muslims illegal and unconstitutional. Justice UU Lalit was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court on 13 August in 2014. A renowned senior advocate shifted his practice to Delhi in January 1986. Later in April 2004, he was designated as a senior advocate by the apex court. 

He was also a part of the bench that sentenced Vijay Mallya to four months of imprisonment in 2017. Justice Lalit was appointed a special public prosecutor for the CBI to conduct the trial in the 2G spectrum allocation case. Since then, he has been involved in the delivery of several landmark judgments of the apex court. 

Notably in the Triple Talaq verdict, while the then CJI J S Khehar and Justice S Abdul Nazeer were in favour of putting on hold the judgment for six months and asking the government to come out with a law to that effect, justices Kurian Joseph, R F Nariman and Lalit held the practice as violative of the Constitution. 

Need to deploy modern technological tools: NV Ramana

Meanwhile, the outgoing Chief Justice N.V. Ramana on Friday apologised for not being able to list all the pending matters. Chief Justice Ramana said the court has been firefighting pendency, which rose alarmingly during the pandemic months.

“The only way out for this is to reform the functioning of the system. We need to deploy modern technological tools and Artificial Intelligence to find a lasting solution. Even though we tried developing some modules, because of compatibility and security issues, we could not make much progress. Due to the COVID emergency, the priority was running the courts. Unfortunately, during the past 16 months of my tenure as CJI, full-fledged hearing was possible only for about 50 days,” Chief Justice Ramana told lawyers in the court on his last working day.