Legendary lawyer and former law minister Shanti Bhushan passes away

A vocal activist against corruption and a champion of civil liberties, he fought for causes of great public interest

Eminent jurist and former Law Minister Shanti Bhushan, Senior Advocate passed away at his home in Delhi at 7 pm on 31 January, following a brief illness. He was aged 97.

Bhushan had represented politician Raj Narain in the historic case in Allahabad High Court. It resulted in unseating of Indira Gandhi as the Prime Minister in 1974.

He served as the Law Minister of India from 1977 to 1979 in the Morarji Desai Cabinet. In 1980, he founded the famous NGO 'Centre for Public Interest Litigation', which filed several important PILs in the Supreme Court.

Along with his illustrious son Prashant Bhushan, also a lawyer-activist, he started the 'Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Judicial Reforms' pressing for judicial accountability.

In 2018, Bhushan filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking changes in the 'master of the roster' system, challenging the roster practice allocation of cases by the Chief Justice of India. However, the court maintained that the CJI had the prerogative and authority to allocate cases to different benches of the apex court.

Bhushan's entire academic education was in Allahabad and he stood 13th in Uttar Pradesh in high school. He began practicing law in 1948.