Since the inception of the Supreme Court of India on 28 January 1950, the Chief Justice of India has been the highest judicial officer. Below is the historical chronology of all Chief Justices, detailing their tenure and background.
Harilal Jekisundas Kania
Sir Harilal Jekisundas "H. J." Kania (3 November 1890 – 6 November 1951) was the first Chief Justice of India. He served as the Chief Justice of India from 1950 until his death in office in 1951.
Mandakolathur Patanjali Sastri
Mandakolathur Patanjali Sastri (4 January 1889 – 16 March 1963) was the second Chief Justice of India, serving in the post from 7 November 1951 to 3 January 1954.
Mehr Chand Mahajan
Mehr Chand Mahajan (23 December 1889 – 11 December 1967) was an Indian jurist and politician who was the third chief justice of the Supreme Court of India. Prior to that he was the prime minister of the state of Jammu and Kashmir during the reign of Maharaja Hari Singh and played a key role in the accession of the state to India. He was the Indian National Congress nominee on the Radcliffe Commission that defined the boundaries of India and Pakistan.
Bijan Kumar Mukherjea
Bijan Kumar Mukherjea (Bengali: বিজন কুমার মুখার্জী; 15 August 1891 – 22 February 1956) was the 4th Chief Justice of India. He was in his office from 22 December 1954 to 31 January 1956.
Sudhi Ranjan Das
Sudhi Ranjan Das (1 October 1894 – 18 September 1977) was the 5th Chief Justice of India, serving from 1 February 1956 to 30 September 1959. Das also served as chairman of The Statesman.
Bhuvaneshwar Prasad Sinha
Bhuvaneshwar Prasad Sinha of Shahabad (now Bhojpur), Bengal Presidency (1 February 1899 – 12 November 1986) was the 6th Chief Justice of India (1 October 1959 – 31 January 1964). He also served as the president of the Bharat Scouts and Guides from April 1965 to February 1967.
Pralhad Balacharya Gajendragadkar
Pralhad Balacharya Gajendragadkar (16 March 1901 – 12 June 1981) was the 7th Chief Justice of India, serving from February 1964 to March 1966.
Amal Kumar Sarkar
Justice Amal Kumar Sarkar (Bengali: অমল কুমার সরকার) (29 June 1901 – 18 December 2001) was the eighth Chief Justice of India, from 16 March 1966 up to his retirement on 29 June 1966.
Koka Subba Rao
Koka Subba Rao (15 July 1902 – 6 May 1976) was the ninth Chief Justice of India (1966–1967). He also served as the Chief Justice of the Andhra Pradesh High Court.
Kailas Nath Wanchoo
He was born in Allahabad into a Kashmiri Pandit family and was educated on primary at Nowgong, Madhya Pradesh and middle at Pandit Pirthi Nath High School, Kanpur, Muir Central College, Allahabad and Wadham College, Oxford. He joined the Indian Civil Service as Joint Magistrate on 1 December 1926 in Uttar Pradesh.
Mohammad Hidayatullah
Mohammad Hidayatullah, OBE (pronunciationⓘ; 17 December 1905 – 18 September 1992) was an Indian jurist and statesman who served as interim President of India in 1969. He concurrently served as Chief Justice of India from 1968 to 1970 and then as Vice President of India from 1979 to 1984.
Jayantilal Chhotalal Shah
Jayantilal Chhotalal Shah (22 January 1906 – 4 January 1991) was the twelfth Chief Justice of India from 17 December 1970 until his retirement on 21 January 1971. He was born in Ahmedabad.
Sarv Mittra Sikri
Sarv Mittra Sikri (26 April 1908 – 24 September 1992) was an Indian lawyer and judge who served as the 13th Chief Justice of India.
Ajit Nath Ray
Ajit Nath Ray (29 January 1912 – 25 December 2009) was the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of India from 25 April 1973 till his retirement on 28 January 1977.
Mirza Hameedullah Beg
Mirza Hameedullah Beg (M. H. Beg) (22 February 1913 – 19 November 1988) was the 15th Chief Justice of India, serving from January 1977 to February 1978.
Yeshwant Vishnu Chandrachud
Yeshwant Vishnu Chandrachud (12 July 1920 – 14 July 2008) was an Indian jurist who served as the 16th Chief Justice of India, serving from 22 February 1978 until 11 July 1985. Born in Pune in the Bombay Presidency, he was first appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of India on 28 August 1972 and is the longest-serving Chief Justice in India's history at 7 years and 4 months. His nickname was Iron Hands after his well-regarded unwillingness to let anything slip past him.
Prafullachandra Natwarlal Bhagwati
Prafullachandra Natwarlal Bhagwati (21 December 1921 – 15 June 2017) was the 17th Chief Justice of India, serving from 12 July 1985 until his retirement on 20 December 1986. He introduced the concepts of public interest litigation and absolute liability in India, and for this reason is held, along with Justice V. R. Krishna Iyer, to be a pioneer of judicial activism in the country. He is the longest-served supreme court judge (including Chief Justice to tenure) in India.
Raghunandan Swarup Pathak
Raghunandan Swarup Pathak (25 November 1924 – 17 November 2007) was the 18th Chief Justice of India. He was the son of Gopal Swarup Pathak, a former Vice President of India.
Engalaguppe Seetharamiah Venkataramiah
Engalaguppe Seetharamiah Venkataramiah (18 December 1924 – 24 September 1997) was the 19th Chief Justice of India, serving from 19 June 1989 until his retirement on 17 December 1989. He began his legal career in 1946, and was appointed as a judge of Karnataka High Court in November 1970.
Sabyasachi Mukharji
Sabyasachi Mukharji (1 June 1927 – 25 September 1990) was an Indian jurist, who was the twentieth Chief Justice of India. He also previously served as the acting Chief Justice of the Calcutta High Court.
Ranganath Misra
Ranganath Misra (25 November 1926 – 13 September 2012) was the 21st Chief Justice of India, serving from 25 September 1990 to 24 November 1991. He was also the first chairman of the National Human Rights Commission of India. He also served as Member of Parliament in Rajya Sabha from the Congress Party between 1998 and 2004. He is the second Supreme Court judge to become a Rajya Sabha member after Baharul Islam who was also elected as Indian National Congress member.
Kamal Narain Singh
Kamal Narain Singh (13 December 1926 – 8 September 2022) was an Indian jurist who served as the 22nd Chief Justice of India. He was educated at L.R.L.A. High School in Sirsa and Ewing Christian College in Allahabad and was a graduate of the University of Allahabad. At 17 days, his tenure as chief justice is the shortest.
Madhukar Hiralal Kania
Madhukar Hiralal "M. H." Kania (18 November 1927 – 1 February 2016) was an Indian judge who became the 23rd Chief Justice of India, serving from 13 December 1991 until his retirement on 17 November 1992. He was born in Bombay. His uncle, Sir Harilal Jekisundas Kania, was the first Chief Justice of India. As Chief Justice of India, he administered the oath of office to the 9th President of India Shankar Dayal Sharma.
Lalit Mohan Sharma
Lalit Mohan Sharma (12 February 1928 – 3 November 2008) was the 24th Chief Justice of India, serving for 85 days, from 18 November 1992 until 11 February 1993. He was the son of L.N. Sinha, former Attorney General of India.
Manepalli Narayanarao Venkatachaliah
Manepalli Narayanarao Venkatachaliah (born 25 October 1929) was the 25th Chief Justice of India, serving from 1993 to 1994. He currently serves as the Chancellor of Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning (Deemed University) and on the advisory board of Foundation for Restoration of National Values, a society established in 2008 that strives to restore "national and cultural values" of India.
Aziz Mushabber Ahmadi
Aziz Mushabber Ahmadi (25 March 1932 – 2 March 2023) was an Indian judge who was the 26th Chief Justice of India. After serving as a judge in the Gujarat High Court, Ahmadi was appointed judge to the Supreme Court in 1988. He was Chief Justice of India from 1994 to 1997. He served as chancellor at the Aligarh Muslim University for two terms.
Jagdish Sharan Verma
Jagdish Sharan Verma (18 January 1933 – 22 April 2013) was an Indian jurist who served as the 27th Chief Justice of India from 25 March 1997 to 18 January 1998. He was the chairman of the National Human Rights Commission from 1999 to 2003, and chairman of the Justice Verma Committee Report on Amendments to Criminal Law after the 2012 Delhi gang rape case. He remains one of India's most highly regarded Chief Justices and eminent jurists in its history.
Madan Mohan Punchhi
Madan Mohan Punchhi (10 October 1933 – 17 June 2015) was the 28th Chief Justice of India from 18 January 1998 until his retirement on 9 October 1998.
Adarsh Sein Anand
Adarsh Sein Anand (1 November 1936 – 1 December 2017) was the 29th Chief Justice of India, serving from 10 October 1998 to 31 October 2001.
Sam Piroj Bharucha
Sam Piroj Bharucha (6 May 1937) is a former Chief Justice of India, serving from November 2001 until his retirement in 2002.
Bhupinder Nath Kirpal
Bhupinder Nath Kirpal (B. N. Kirpal) (born 8 November 1937) is a retired Indian judge who was the 31st Chief Justice of India, serving from 6 May 2002 until his retirement on 7 November 2002.
Gopal Ballav Pattanaik
Gopal Ballav Pattanaik (born 19 December 1937) is an Indian lawyer and later a jurist who served for 19 years on the bench of the Odisha High Court as a permanent judge, as chief justice of Patna High Court, judge of the Supreme Court of India and as the 32nd Chief Justice of India.
Vishweshwar Nath Khare
Vishweshwar Nath Khare is a retired Indian judge who served as the 33rd Chief Justice of India, from 19 December 2002 to 1 May 2004. He also served as the Chancellor of the Central University of Jharkhand from 2017 to 2023. He was a judge of the Supreme Court of India from 21 March 1997 before he was elevated to the post of Chief Justice.
Sanjeevalu Rajendra Babu
S. Rajendra Babu (born 1 June 1939) was the 34th Chief Justice of India. He also served as the chairperson of National Human Rights Commission of India.
Ramesh Chandra Lahoti
Ramesh Chandra Lahoti (1 November 1940 – 23 March 2022) was the 35th Chief Justice of India, serving from 1 June 2004 to 1 November 2005.
Yogesh Kumar Sabharwal
Sabharwal worked as an advocate for Indian Railways from 1969 to 1981, as an advocate for Delhi administration from 1973 to 1976–1977, later as Additional Standing Counsel and then as Standing Counsel. He also served as counsel to the Central Government from 1980 to 1986. He represented Delhi in the Bar Council of India from 1969 to 1973.
Konakuppakatil Gopinathan Balakrishnan
Konakuppakatil Gopinathan Balakrishnan (born 12 May 1945) is an Indian judge who served as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of India from 2007 to 2010, and later as chairperson of the National Human Rights Commission of India. He was the first judge from Kerala and the first Dalit to become the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. He remained the only Dalit to have held the position until the elevation of Bhushan Ramkrishna Gavai as Chief Justice in 2025. His tenure lasting more than three years has been one of the longest in the Supreme Court. While being Chief Justice of Gujarat High Court, he was appointed the acting governor of Gujarat from 16 January 1999 to 18 March 1999. In 2010, he was conferred with an honorary doctorate by Cochin University of Science and Technology.
Sarosh Homi Kapadia
Sarosh Homi Kapadia (29 September 1947 – 4 January 2016) was the 38th Chief Justice of India. He was the first chief justice born after the partition of India (Dominion of India).
Altamas Kabir
Altamas Kabir (19 July 1948 – 19 February 2017) was an Indian lawyer and judge who served as the 39th Chief Justice of India.
Palanisamy Sathasivam
Palanisamy Sathasivam (born 27 April 1949) is a retired Indian judge who served as the 40th Chief Justice of India, holding the office from 2013 to 2014. On retirement from his judicial career, Sathasivam was appointed the 21st Governor of Kerala from 5 September 2014 to 4 September 2019. Sathasivam is the second judge from Tamil Nadu to become the CJI, after M. Patanjali Sastri. He is also the first former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court to be appointed the Governor of a state. He is the first Governor of Kerala to be appointed by the Narendra Modi Government.
Rajendra Mal Lodha
R. M. Lodha (born 28 September 1949) is a former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of India. Before being elevated to the Supreme Court, he served as the chief justice of Patna High Court. He has also served as a judge in Rajasthan High Court and Bombay High Court. On 14 July 2015, the Supreme Court committee headed by Lodha suspended the owners of Rajasthan Royals and Chennai Super Kings from the Indian Premier League cricket tournament for a period of two years for alleged involvement in betting.
Handyala Lakshminarayanaswamy Dattu
Handyala Lakshminarayanaswamy Dattu (born 3 December 1950) is a former Chief Justice of India, and former chairman of the National Human Rights Commission. As the chief justice, he served for nearly 14 months, from 28 September 2014 to 2 December 2015. Before his elevation as a judge of the Supreme Court of India on 17 December 2008, he had served as the Chief Justice of the Kerala High Court and Chhattisgarh High Court.
Tirath Singh Thakur
Tirath Singh Thakur (born 4 January 1952) is an Indian jurist who served as the 43rd Chief Justice of India (CJI) from 3 December 2015 to 4 January 2017. Before being elevated to the Supreme Court, he served as the Chief Justice of Punjab and Haryana High Court from August 2008 to November 2009 .He has also served as a senior judge in Karnataka High Court from March 1994 to July 2004 and Jammu and Kashmir High Court from February to March 1994.
Jagdish Singh Khehar
Jagdish Singh Khehar (born 28 August 1952) is an Indian jurist, who served as the 44th Chief Justice of India from 4 January 2017 to 27 August 2017. He was the first Sikh Chief Justice of India. He has been a judge in Supreme Court of India from 13 September 2011 to 27 August 2017 upon superannuation. He served for a brief period but gave many landmark judgements such as the Triple Talaq and the Right to Privacy verdicts. He was succeeded by Justice Dipak Misra. As Chief Justice of India, he also administered oath of office to 14th President of India Ram Nath Kovind.
Dipak Misra
Dipak Misra (born 3 October 1953) is an Indian jurist who served as the 45th Chief Justice of India from 28 August 2017 till 2 October 2018. He is also a former Chief Justice of the Patna High Court and Delhi High Court. He is the nephew of Justice Ranganath Misra, the 21st Chief Justice of India from 1990 to 1991.
Ranjan Gogoi
Ranjan Gogoi (born 18 November 1954) is an Indian jurist and advocate who served as the 46th Chief Justice of India from 2018 to 2019 and as a Member of the Rajya Sabha from 2020 to 2026. He previously served as a judge of the Supreme Court of India from 2012 to 2018. Gogoi was a judge of the Gauhati High Court from 2001 to 2010, and of the Punjab and Haryana High Court from September 2010 to February 2011 where he later was the Chief Justice from 2011 to 2012.
Sharad Arvind Bobde
Sharad Arvind Bobde (born 24 April 1956) is a retired Indian judge who served as the 47th Chief Justice of India from 18 November 2019 to 23 April 2021.
Nuthalapati Venkata Ramana
Nuthalapati Venkata Ramana (; born 27 August 1957) is a former Indian judge and journalist who served as the 48th Chief Justice of India.
Uday Umesh Lalit
Uday Umesh Lalit (born 9 November 1957) is an Indian lawyer and former Supreme Court judge, who served as the 49th Chief Justice of India. Prior to his elevation as a judge of the Supreme Court, he practised as a senior advocate at the Supreme Court. Justice Lalit is one of the eleven senior counsels who have been directly elevated to the Supreme Court. He is currently ‘Distinguished Visiting Professor’ at Ashank Desai Centre for Policy Studies, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay and Distinguished Visiting Professor at West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences.
Dhananjaya Yeshwant Chandrachud
Dhananjaya Yeshwant Chandrachud (born 11 November 1959) is a retired Indian jurist, who served as the 50th Chief Justice of India from 9 November 2022 to 10 November 2024. He was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of India in May 2016. He has also previously served as the chief justice of the Allahabad High Court from 2013 to 2016 and as a judge of the Bombay High Court from 2000 to 2013. He also served as the ex-officio Patron-in-Chief of the National Legal Services Authority and the de facto Chancellor of the National Law School of India University.
Sanjiv Khanna
Sanjiv Khanna (born 14 May 1960) is a retired Indian jurist who served as the 51st Chief Justice of India from 11 November 2024 to 13 May 2025. He was the ex officio Patron-in-Chief of the National Legal Services Authority and the de facto Chancellor of the National Law School of India University. He has also served as a judge at the Delhi High Court.
Bhushan Ramkrishna Gavai
Bhushan Ramkrishna Gavai (born 24 November 1960) is a retired Indian jurist who had served as the 52nd Chief Justice of India (CJI) from 14 May to 23 November 2025. He is a former judge of the Bombay High Court and also served as the chancellor of some National Law Universities (NLUs). He is the second-ever CJI to be from the Scheduled Castes. During his term as CJI, he also served as ex officio patron-in-chief of the National Legal Services Authority.
Surya Kant
Surya Kant (born 10 February 1962) is an Indian judge who is serving as the 53rd Chief Justice of India from 24 November 2025. Prior to his elevation as judge, Kant was a Senior Advocate and also served as the Advocate General for Haryana. He is also the visitor of National University of Study and Research in Law, Ranchi. Furthermore, he is the ex officio patron-in-chief of National Legal Services Authority.
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