Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud

Dr. Justice Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud is the Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court and an eminent jurist in India.[1][2][3]

Early life and education

Born on 11 November 1959. His father Yeshwant Vishnu Chandrachud was Chief Justice of India. His mother Prabha was a classical musician and trained with Kishori Amonkar, one of India's foremost classical musicians.After attending Cathedral and John Connon School,Mumbai and St. Columba's School, Delhi, he graduated in honours with Economics and Mathematics from St. Stephen's College, New Delhi in 1979.[4] He topped the Honours' list of the University of Delhi in his final year. He obtained his LL.B. degree from Delhi University in 1982 and an LL.M. degree from Harvard University in 1983. At Harvard, he received the Joseph H Beale prize.He also did his Doctorate of Juridical Sciences (S.J.D.), from Harvard University in 1986.[5] His thesis was on Affirmative Action and considered the law in a comparative framework. He was conferred with an Honoris Causa LL.D by Lucknow University, India in 2015.

Career

Chandrachud practised as Counsel before the Bombay High Court and specialised in constitutional law and public law. During his stint at the Bar, he was a member of a Committee appointed by the Supreme Court of India to report on environmental damage to the beaches of Mumbai. He was appointed as Additional Solicitor General of India (1998–2000), and designated a Senior Advocate in 1998. Between 1988 and 1997, he was a Visiting Professor of Comparative Constitutional Law at the University of Mumbai.On 29 March 2000, he was appointed as Judge of the High Court at Bombay, aged 40 at that time. He was also the Director of the Maharashtra Judicial Academy and Indian Mediation Training Institute. He was sworn as an the Chief Justice of Allahabad High Court on 31 October 2013.

Some of his landmark judgements are in the areas of constitutional law and the protection of human rights. He has authored several articles on human rights. He has recently co edited a book titled " A Heritage of Judging - the Bombay High Court through One Hundred and Fifty Years " to mark the sesquicentennial of the High Court. As a strong proponent of liberal constitutional values he has written several judgments protecting the freedom of speech and expression. He set aside bans on the broadcast of films and on the staging of plays. As a senior judge of the High Court he was a part of the Bench overseeing several important public interest cases including the protection of child rights, malnutrition, architectural heritage and the preservation of mangroves. Chandrachud delivered a landmark judgment on the preservation of the heritage precincts of Mumbai which paved the way for the removal of hoardings which obstructed the pristine view of important architectural buildings of the city.

Chandrachud has authored several important judgments in the area of environmental jurisprudence. One of them on Environmental Impact Assessments emphasised the importance of objective scientific assessment of the likely impact. He was a member of the Bench of the Bombay High Court which mandated the conversion of public transport vehicles including buses and taxis to Compressed Natural Gas to reduce environmental pollution. In another decision Chandrachud mandated the use of GIS technology to map the green cover in the Pune Urban agglomeration. The decision emphasised the need for transparent mechanisms for environmental governance by ensuring the reconstitution of a Tree Authority consisting of experts and by laying down norms for granting development permissions in Pune while factoring in environmental compliance by ensuring transplantation and replanting of trees. Chandrachud was a member of a Bench which directed a satellite mapping of mangroves along the coast of Mumbai. His decisions have sought to balance the need for development and economic growth with clear decision making procedures which ensure transparent and accountable governance.

As judge of the Bombay High Court Chandrachud specialised in constitutional, commercial, civil and tax jurisdictions. As a trial judge, he initially presided over the trials of civil suits in the Bombay High court, which is one of the Chartered High Courts with Original jurisdiction. As a senior judge of the High Court Chandrachud presided over the Division Bench hearing intra court appeals. He has authored several judgments on commercial law, securities law, intellectual property, admiralty and taxation. In the law of arbitration, his decisions attempt to ensure the sanctity of commercial arbitration as a form of dispute resolution. He authored a path breaking judgment which upheld the right of Indian Tax authorities to impose a tax on capital gains on the transfer of shares abroad where there is a transfer of an underlying asset or business in India. At the Allahabad High Court he has authored several judgments on topics as diverse as gender, environmental protection, regulation of financial markets, taxation and public interest litigation. Among the cases in which Justice Chandrachud has issued directions, are those relating to the prevention of ecological damage due to illegal sand mining, unregulated brick kilns; rehabilitation of acid attack victims of gender violence; and protection of basic human rights including food security. At the same time he has propounded the necessity of drawing the boundaries for judicial intervention, taking care to ensure that the separation of powers between the legislature, executive and the judiciary is maintained.

He has been a speaker at the Harvard Law School, Yale Law School, Australian National University and University of Witswatersrand. He has been a speaker at conferences organized by UNHCR, Asian Development Bank, The World Bank Group and UNEP. In India, Chandrachud has addressed audiences at the National Law Schools at Bangalore and Hyderabad, the Government Law College, Mumbai and at several law schools across the country. He has been a guest speaker at the Asiatic Society of Mumbai. As a judge of the Bombay High Court he was chair of a committee of experts constituted to revamp the century old Government Law College at Mumbai. He is an honorary editor of the Law Review of the Government Law College.

The Maharashtra Judicial Academy which he headed looks after the training of nearly one thousand nine hundred judges in the state. He has been actively associated with programmes for judicial training. He is a member of the National Legal Services Authority of India.

References

  1. ↑
  2. ↑ V. M. Salgaocar College of Law – Goa, India
  3. ↑ M E D I A T I O N
  4. ↑ "Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud Dr. Justice". Achievers. Old Columbans' Association. Retrieved 9 April 2012.
  5. ↑ "Harvard alumni DY Chandrachud to take oath as chief justice of high court". The Times Of India. Retrieved 2013-11-19.

External links