Hima Kohli Takes Charge as Maiden Women Chief Justice of Telangana High Court

By: WE Team | Thursday, 7 January 2021

Justice Hima Kohli is sworn in as the next and the first woman Chief Justice of Telangana High Court. Justice Hima, till recently, served as a senior judge of the Delhi High Court.

The netizens were keen to notice and cheer to the fact that the one administering the oath of office to Justice Kohli happened to be the woman state governor of Telangana Tamilisai Soundararajan.

The modern feat has led many directly to recall the first-ever woman Chief Justice of any state High Court. Justice Leila Seth, on August 5 1991 became the Chief Justice of Himachal Pradesh High Court. 

Among the other State High Courts that have had woman Chief Justice that include, Sujata Manohar who was appointed as the Chief Justice of Kerala High Court in 1999. While Justice R Bhanumathi became the Chief Justice in August 2014. Jharkhand High Court has the distinction of having two woman Chief Justices with Justice Gyan Sudha Misra being appointed as the CJ in April 2010. Justice Indira Banerjee, the former Chief Justice of Madras High Court, is currently among the only two female judges of the Supreme Court.

Justice J.S Khehar once remarked, "The ratio of female judges to male judges must be in the same ratio." In a country of a billion-plus, where the list of Chief Justices of India post Independence runs long enough to not be on the fingertips, it's a little unfortunate that India is yet to see its woman CJI.

It was only in December that Attorney-General K.K.Venugopal suggested that more women judges in constitutional courts would improve gender sensitivity. He was speaking on the Supreme Court's invitation to suggest ways to gender sensitize judges. An opportunity he seized to also let the Apex Court know that we've not had a woman Chief Justice of India.