A growing belief that Supreme Court is CJI's court and not of all judges: CJI BR Gavai
Chief Justice of India BR Gavai recently addressed the notion of the Supreme Court being considered that court of the chief justice nowadays.
Speaking at the felicitation ceremony conducted in his honor by the High Court Bar Association of Nagpur, the CJI said, "It is a growing belief that the Supreme Court is the chief justice's court and not the court of all the judges, but I must say that it is a matter of pride that Justice Lalit and Justice Sanjeev Khanna and I have attempted to dispel that notion.".
CJI Gavai further said that he immediately after taking oath, held a full court meeting and all the decisions taken during that meeting were the decisions of the judges of the Supreme Court and not of Justice Gavai alone as the Chief Justice of India.
Justice Gavai expressed his deep privileged to be present for the ceremony on the evening of June 28th and said, "This is my fifth felicitation and one of the last ones, but the most important one for me because it is this Association which has made me what I am today.".
Former CJI UU Lalit was also part of the event hosted at Kavivarya Suresh Bhat Auditorium, Reshimbagh, Nagpur. On his presence, CJI Gavai expressed his deep privilege to be facilitated by none other than Justice UU Lalit, who was his chief Justice for only 76 days.
"It is said that in the past Justice Lodha, who was with us in Delhi was one of the finest chief justices, but I can share on this occasion, I have seen about half a dozen chief justices, but the two chief justice whom I am highly impressed, both of them who had a short stint, one is chief Justice Uday Lalit and chief Justice Sanjeev Khanna...", CJI Gavai added.
Speaking further on the tenure of former CJI's Lalit and Khanna, CJI Gavai said that both of them brought in transparency and democracy. It is because of Justice Uday Lalit constituting the five constitution benches headed by senior most judges of the Supreme Court that I got an opportunity to pen down my first Constitution bench judgement on the demonetization case, CJI Gavai remarked.
Like Justice Lalit and Justice Khanna, CJI Gavai said that he is also a firm believer of the principle that the chief justice is only the first among equals and not the master of the Supreme Court.
The felicitation event was also attended by Supreme Court judges Justice AS Chandurkar, Justice Prasanna B Varale and Justice Dipankar Dutta. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and Advocate General of Maharashtra, Birender Saraf were also present at the event.