CJI Dipak Misra sticks to tradition, recommends Justice Ranjan Gogoi’s name as his successor

Justice Ranjan Gogoi is a judge of the Supreme Court of India. His father Keshab Chandra Gogoi was a  staunch Congressman and former Chief minister of Assam

Ending months of speculation over the name of the next Chief Justice of India, incumbent Dipak Misra has endorsed Justice Ranjan Gogoi, the senior-most judge in the Supreme Court, for the post.

According to sources, CJI Misra has sent his recommendation to the Ministry of Law and Justice endorsing Justice Gogoi as his successor. As per convention, the outgoing CJI sends the recommendation about his successor 30 days before he is to demit office.

The outgoing CJI usually recommends the name of the senior-most judge of the Supreme Court as his successor.

Justice Gogoi is likely to take oath as 46th CJI on 3 October. He is due to retire on November 17, 2019.

Earlier, rumours about the government introducing a bill to increase the retirement age of judges were doing the rounds in media, only to be later put to rest by Law Ministry denying such speculations.

It is worth the mention that Justice Ranjan Gogoi was one of the four senior Supreme Court judges — Justices J Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, MB Lokur and Kurian Joseph — who virtually revolted against CJI Misra over “selective” case allocation and certain judicial orders in January this year.

The four senior Supreme Court judges had called a press conference in New Delhi in the second week of January and said the situation in the top court was “not in order” and that many “less than desirable” things had taken place.

At the unprecedented press conference, Justice Gogoi had hinted that the allocation of a case seeking an investigation in the death of special CBI judge BH Loya to a junior judge led to the ‘revolt’.

Earlier this month, CJI Misra broke his silence on the judges’ revolt saying that the real challenge to the judicial system was to transform it into a performing one with composure and rationality.

“To criticise, attack and destroy a system is quite easy. What is difficult and challenging is to transform it into a performing one. For this one has to transcend one’s personal ambitions or grievances,” CJI Dipak Misra had said while speaking at the Independence Day function organised in the Supreme Court by the Supreme Court Bar Association.

“Concrete reforms must be undertaken with rationality, maturity, responsibility and composure. It’s necessary to be productive instead of being counter-productive,” he said.

“Only then the institution can go to greater heights,” Misra added.