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Petwar in Haryana’s Hisar celebrates its son Surya Kant’s rise as CJI
First from the state of Haryana to reach the country’s highest judicial office, justice Surya Kant was sworn in by President Droupadi Murmu
As justice Surya Kant took oath as the 53rd Chief Justice of India (CJI) at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi on Monday, he was surrounded by family, school and college friends, teachers from Rohtak’s Maharshi Dayanand University (MDU), colleagues from the Punjab and Haryana high court and residents of his native village Petwar in Hisar.
First from the state of Haryana to reach the country’s highest judicial office, justice Surya Kant was sworn in by President Droupadi Murmu. Vice-President CP Radhakrishnan, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and several ministers from his cabinet attended the swearing-in.
Also among the 235 invitees at the event was KPS Mehalwal, a retired head of the law department at MDU. He recalled Surya Kant as an intelligent and active student. “I taught him from 1981 to 1984. No teacher can predict a student’s future, but his appointment as Haryana’s advocate general at a young age was the turning point of his career. He always honoured his teachers and remained dedicated and disciplined,” Mehalwal said.
Former MDU registrar Satpal Vats also attended the ceremony with five family members, including his elder brother and former BJP Rajya Sabha MP DP Vats. The families share three generations of ties. “Surya’s father Madan Gopal, who taught me Hindi and Sanskrit, once asked me to arrange hostel accommodation for him during his LLB. My father had also taught his father. My mother, whom Surya fondly called Dadi ji, often blessed him saying he would become a big judge. She passed away this February and could not see him become the CJI,” he said.
Surya Kant’s brother Rishi Kant said their parents, family members, friends from Petwar and Bar members from Hisar joined the ceremony. “He visited our ancestral house recently and spent an hour in his old study room. Every year he returns to the village to honour meritorious Class 10 and 12 students,” he added.
Speaking at MDU’s law department in January 2023, justice Surya Kant had shared that his schooling till Class 8 at Petwar’s government school was without fans or electricity, and they used to sit on the floor or under the open sky.
Only four of 68 students cleared Class 10 in his school that year.
His first experience with a city came during a scholarship exam in Hansi, 23 km away. Though his family wanted him to prepare for competitive exams, he chose law and completed his degree at MDU in 1984.
He recalled a teacher urging him to pursue LLM when he was leaving for Chandigarh to register with the Bar, but he had already begun practising in Hisar. A judge there, impressed by his arguments, advised him to move to the high court. In 1985, with help from his senior, he shifted to Chandigarh.
At the age of 38, he became Haryana’s advocate general in 2000. “On January 9, 2004, in the morning I resigned as advocate general and at 10 am, I took oath as a judge in the Punjab and Haryana high court,” he had said.
In October 2018, he took charge as chief justice of the Himachal Pradesh high court before his elevation to the Supreme Court in May 2019.
As the CJI, justice Kant will serve a tenure of nearly 15 months till February 9, 2027, when he will demit office upon turning 65.
Haryana chief minister Nayab Singh Saini, through a post on X, said justice Surya Kant’s appointment as the 53rd CJI was a matter of pride for all Haryanvis.
Senior Congress leader Randeep Singh Surjewala said justice Kant’s rise to the top reflected unfathomable power of courage, belief and hard work. “He is admired across the Bar for his patience and extraordinary memory, and respected on the bench for his experience, balance and ability to carry everyone along,” the Congress general secretary and former Haryana minister wrote on X.
