Chief Justice of India continues ......

“Sir, I have the satisfaction to know from you that during my short regime of office that I have been presiding over the deliberations of the highest Court in the land, people have gained considerable confidence in the administration of justice. I know on occasions our judgments may not have been liked by those who had their own views on matters.

We have been criticized and we are quite familiar with those criticisms. But one is always amused to see persons who are more or less ignorant of basic principles of jurisprudence, criticizing Judges who have spent their lives in legal learning and in acquiring the judicial frame of mind. Anyway, that should not deter any Judge, whether his judgments are liked or disliked, from doing justice according to the oath that the President of India administers to us on the day that we take our office, to do justice without fear or favour, without affection or ill-will, likes or dislikes. I have the satisfaction to know that I have during the time that I presided in this Court been able to be true to the oath I took.

“Now, my Lord, the Chief Justice-designate, I took this torch of justice from one whom I described as Lord Buddha. I am handing it over to a person to whom I give the-appellation ‘Rishi’, who is a Rishi in the true sense of that term. I hope that the scales of justice will be held even by him.

The Judges of the supreme Court may have differed on occasions and there might have been sharp differences of opinions but we have been a happy family and I have been very very lucky in that respect. I am deeply grateful to them. I hope they will remember me, if not for anything else, at least for what my Lord the Chief Justice-designate has described—for my hospitality and affection towards them—and I shall never forget them even in my retirement.

“I Thank you very much for the kind words you have spoken about me and I will keep them in my mind in my retirement.”