Chief Justice of India UU Lalit on Tuesday recommended Justice DY Chandrachud as his successor, reported Bar and Bench.
On October 7, the Union Ministry of Law and Justice had asked Lalit to name his successor. If the Centre accepts his proposal, Chandrachud will remain in office for two years till November 10, 2024, as the 50th chief justice of India.
Lalit is scheduled to retire on November 8 at the end of 74-day tenure as the chief justice.
On Tuesday, Lalit had requested all Supreme Court judges to be present in the court’s lounge so that a letter nominating Chandrachud as the next chief justice can be handed over in their presence.
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Chandrachud was appointed as a Supreme Court judge on May 13, 2016, after serving as the chief justice of the Allahabad High Court for over two-and-a-half years.
Son of former Chief Justice of India YV Chandrachud, he was designated as a senior advocate by the Bombay High Court in June 1998. In March 2000, he was appointed as a judge at the High Court.
DY Chandrachud also served as the additional solicitor general from 1998 till he was appointed as a judge.
During his tenure as a Supreme Court judge, Chandrachud has delivered several landmark verdicts, including declaring privacy a fundamental right.
He was also part of the five-judge bench that had unanimously decriminalised homosexual activity between consenting adults. Through this judgement, the court had also turned down its own order from 2013 when it had said only the legislature can change laws.
In November 2019, Chandrachud was among the five judges who had unanimously decided that the disputed plot in Ayodhya be handed over to a trust for building a Ram temple there. The bench had also ruled that a separate five-acre plot be allotted in Ayodhya to Muslims for the construction of a mosque.
Last month, a bench of Justices DY Chandrachud, JB Pardiwala and AS Bopanna had ruled that women who are pregnant from a consensual relationship outside wedlock are allowed to have abortions up to 24 weeks.
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