S.H. Kapadia - Class IV to CJI

Sarosh Homi Kapadia, Chief Justice of India has proved that Indian judicial system has sufficient power to question the Prime Minister as well. It was not possible for government to remove CVC without SC's this verdict and may be that is the reason why PJ Thomas resigned in minutes of SC verdict.s

Since May 2010(when he became the CJI) , people of India has experienced a new phase and a sharp contrast to the earlier phase when KG Balakrishnan was the chief justice. Under leadership of Kapadia the court's credibility has been restored after the damage it had suffered during the 3 year tenure of Balakrishnan, whose kin are now under the scanner for amassing wealth disproportionate to their known sources of income.

He is giving due consideration and utterly focus to PILs :
- PIL againts Balakrishnan
- PIL againts CVC appointment
- PIL in 2G scam
- PIL in CWG scam

Not only this his administration has also given due consideration to
- Ratan Tata's petition raising concerns of privacy and other such related matters and so they were all placed before the already charged-up Singhvi bench.
- revive the police reforms case which had seen little action during the Balakrishnan years. Not only this but current bench for the first time fixed a time frame for states to report compliance of the reforms aimed at reducing political abuse of the police forces.

It is very important to understand that Kapadia has the high level of integrity and honesty and his past is equally dignified. I tried to find more details about him and so ....

Kapadia was born in 1947 in a lower middle-class Parsi family. His father was a clerk in a defence establishment, his mother a homemaker. There was enough to eat, but barely. Kapadia completed his BA and LLB. He started his career as a class IV employee . He acknowledged his humble beginnings in a letter he wrote to Justice V R Krishna Iyer recently. “I come from a poor family. I started my career as a class IV employee and the only asset I possess is integrity...” he said. He joined Gagrat & Co, a law firm as a clerk and later, went to work for firebrand and highly respected labour lawyer Feroze Damania. Soon after, the family moved to Andheri. There, in the neighbouring building lived a young girl, Shahnaz, with whom Kapadia fell in love. She became Mrs Kapadia. They were to have two sons.

The young Sarosh may not have been rich but what he did possess was ambition and determination to become a judge. He became counsel for the income tax department in 1974, aged 27. He also appeared for the then Bombay Municipal Corporation in matters concerning rateable value and octroi. He represented the Maharashtra government and several PSUs until he was appointed a HCJ. As a judge of the Bombay HC, he developed a reputation for his expertise on commercial and tax law.

The best thing that ever happened to him was the stock scam of 1999 involving broker Ketan Parekh. On August 5, 2003, he was appointed CJ of the Uttarakhand HC and in December of that year, he was elevated to the Supreme Court, thus serving only a very short tenure as chief justice of a high court.

Now, the biggest professional challenge for the man who has spent his entire life working towards becoming a judge is to decide who should scrutinise the Chief Justice of India and whether he should come under the purview of the RTI Act. This has far-reaching implications for both law and justice.