Senior Advocate Indu Malhotra was sworn in as a Supreme Court judge on Friday morning. The swearing-in ceremony of the newly-appointed judge took place at the apex court. Malhotra was administered oath of office by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dipak Misra.
Her name was recommended by the Supreme Court's Collegium in January, and approved by the Centre, on Wednesday. Apart from Indu, Uttarakhand Chief Justice KM Joseph was also recommended for elevation to the Supreme Court. However, the Centre asked the collegium to reconsider the same.
Here is all you need to know about Indu Malhotra, the latest entrant to India's Supreme Court:
1. Indu Malhotra is the first woman from the bar to be directly elevated to the Bench.
2. Malhotra will be the seventh woman judge of the top court. She will join Justice M Fathima Beevi, Justice Sujata V Manohar, Justice Ruma Pal, Justice Gyan Sudha Misra and Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai and Justice R Banumati. Currently, Justice R Banumathi is the lone woman judge in the apex court.
3. Malhotra was born in 1956 in Bengaluru and moved to Delhi at a very young age.
4. Her father Om Prakash Malhotra was also a lawyer.
5. She enrolled as a lawyer in the Bar Council of Delhi in 1983.
6. Before joining the legal profession in her 20s, she taught at Miranda House College and Vivekananda College in Delhi for a brief period.
7. In 1988, she qualified as an Advocate-on-Record (AoR) in the Supreme Court.
8. Malhotra was designated as a senior advocate in 2007, only the second woman to be designated a senior advocate by the Supreme Court, after Justice Leila Seth.
9. She has represented statutory bodies like the Securities Exchange Board of India (Sebi), Delhi Development Authority (DDA), Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR), before the Supreme Court.
10. She is an expert on arbitration and has appeared in various domestic and international commercial arbitrations. She has also co-authored a book - The Law and Practice of Arbitration in India.
(With ANI Inputs)
