Uday Umesh Lalit, who will take charge as the 49th Chief Justice of India on August 27, said a mechanism must be devised for speedy percolation of the Supreme Court’s decisions to the ground level and lamented that Muslim women still face vagaries of triple talaq despite it being declared unconstitutional five years ago by the top court.
He said, “look at the civil side, fruits of decree, got after years of litigation, eludes the decree- holder. There the system needs complete tune-up or complete revamp. We may lay down law, but, in the actual dispensation, what happens is there are many misses between the cup and the lip. On the positive side, the law which is getting laid down by the SC is of the highest order”.
Asked why the SC repeatedly rules and espouses the right to equality for women and giving them their due, yet not facilitating appointment of adequate number of them as judges of the constitutional courts. The CJI-designate said the scenario would undergo a complete change in the next 10-15 years. “The number of women judges in the trial courts has risen substantially. For example, in Rajasthan, of the 190 candidates who underwent an induction programme as trial court judges recently, 129 were women. Similar is the story in Odisha and other states. Of the few women judges appointed to the SC, Justice Lalit said if one looks at the talent pool available for selection to the SC, say the 100 most senior HC judges, there are only few women among them. “So it would not be possible to select them, without their acquiring requisite seniority. But I’m very sure the scenario will undergo fast-paced change in the next decade or half,” he said.
