Justice Chelameswar to be appointed SC Judge

KOCHI: Kerala High Court Chief Justice Jasti Chelameswar will soon be appointed a judge at the Supreme Court. A recommendation by the Collegium in this regard has been sent to the President of India. Justice Chelameswar will have a tenure of seven years as Supreme Court judge.Chelameswar, who has delivered many landmark verdicts, was appointed the Chief Justice of Kerala High Court in 2010.  Jasti Chelameswar started his career as an advocate at the High Court of Andhra Pradesh. He was appointed the standing counsel of AP Lokayukta in 1985 and 1986.  He worked as the Government Pleader for Home Affairs in High Court in 1988 and 1989. Chelameswar, who was designated as Senior Counsel in 1995 was later appointed as an Additional Advocate-General. In 1997, he served as the Additional Judge of the High Court of Andhra Pradesh. Later, he became the Chief Justice of Guwahati High Court in 2007. As the Chief Justice of Guwahati High Court in 2007, he delivered many landmark judgments for environmental protection. As a result, he is known as the ‘Green Judge’.  Later, as the Chief Justice of the Kerala High Court too, Chelameswar revived the Green Bench.  One of the important orders that he issued was based on the letter written by a group of students of St Augustine’s Higher Secondary School, Muvattupuzha. The students raised serious concern over wayside trees being nailed for hanging advertisement boards. The court issued notice to the Chief Secretary in this regard.  After a month, the government issued an order preventing local authorities from fixing such boards.It was due to the intervention of Chief Justice that the controversial lottery case was subjected to CBI probe. Contempt of court proceedings were initiated against CPM leader M V Jayarajan by a full Bench presided over by  Chelameswar.