NEW DELHI: Justice Uday Umesh Lalit Saturday became the 49th President of the Supreme Court of India, with President Drupadi Murmu taking the oath in the presence of the Vice President, Prime Minister and other dignitaries.
He is the second chief judge to be directly appointed Supreme Court judge of the forum and subsequently in charge of the judiciary of the country as its head; the first was judge SM Sikri.
Judge Lalit’s term of office will last only 74 days and will cease on November 8 upon retirement.
Despite the short mandate, the CJI is determined to address the problems facing the judiciary and has come up with a plan to reduce dependency and ensure swift disposal of constitutional issues. The most pressing problem facing the judiciary now is the huge pending litigation, which has hit the five crore milestone, including 71,000 cases pending in the Supreme Court. The slope problem got worse due to the Covid pandemic.
With the easing of the pandemic situation and the full functioning of the courts, Justice Lalit decided that the maximum number of seats will sit on Mondays and Fridays in the Supreme Court so that the maximum number of new matters can be heard and disposed of. The apex court under his leadership will also give priority to the decision on constitutional issues, which is the main task of the Supreme Court, and constitutional seats will be formed to decide cases.
Known for his humility, cold temper and for listening with the utmost patience to all lawyers, whether he is an expert or coming to court for the first time, Judge Lalit will also have to address the matter of the list of cases as well as his predecessor accepted that he had not done enough to solve the problem of some cases listed out of rotation while others remained in the queue.
Another issue that is at the heart of Judge Lalit is to spread legal awareness among the people and to provide legal assistance to the poor and dispossessed. He traveled across the country on this “mission” as executive chairman of the National Legal Services Authority (NALSA). He launched the Legal Aid Defense Counsel (LADC) system in 365 districts in 22 states of India to extend free legal aid to the poor.
Born into a family of lawyers on November 9, 1957, he joined as a lawyer in 1983 and practiced at the Bombay High Court. He moved to Delhi in 1986. He was appointed in 2004 as a senior lawyer by the Supreme Court, which also appointed him as special prosecutor of the CBI to lead the trial in all 2G matters. In 2014 he was appointed judge of the Court of Cassation.
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