New Delhi: Chief Justice of India (CJI) D.Y. Chandrachud will receive the Award for Global Leadership, the highest professional distinction handed out by his alma mater Harvard Law School.

In a release, the Harvard Law School Center on the Legal Profession (CLP) said the awarded to the CJI in an online event that would be held on January 11.

CJI Chadrachud holds a master's degree and a doctorate in law (LLM and an SJD) from Harvard Law School.

David Wilkins, CLP faculty director, said, “I know how much India, and indeed the world, need Justice Chandrachud’s leadership, particularly on issues such as the mental health and the well-being of lawyers which he spoke about so eloquently at our conference in 2017 – long before the global pandemic placed this issue in the forefront of the profession’s consciousness.”

Past recipients of the award include Samantha Power (former US Permanent Representative to the United Nations under US President Barack Obama and current head of the Agency for International Development), Brad Smith (vice-chair and president of Microsoft), the late Vernon Jordan (who served as the president of the National Urban League and was a close advisor to Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama), and Kenneth Frazier (executive chair and former CEO of Merck).

Justice Chadrachud was appointed CJI in November 2022. Before his tenure as a Supreme Court judge, he served on the Bombay and Allahabad high courts as a judge. Before entering the judiciary, he worked for Sullivan & Cromwell, as a senior advocate before the Bombay HC, and as an additional solicitor general of India.

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