Chandigarh, Oct. 28 -- The chief justice of India designate, justice Surya Kant, is a man of many firsts. Justice Kant, who rose from being the first lawyer in his family to become the youngest advocate general of Haryana, is now poised to be the first Haryanavi to become the CJI in November 2025. Justice Kant was born on February 10, 1962, in Petwar village, located in the Narnaund area of Hisar, Haryana. His father was a Sanskrit teacher and mother a homemaker. He is the youngest among four brothers and a sister. His educational journey began in a village school where he studied up to matriculation and later did his LLB from MDU, Rohtak, in 1984. "He wanted to be a lawyer from the beginning," recalled his elder brother, Ravi Kant, who lives in the village and is a retired teacher. "Our father initially wanted him to pursue his LLM after the law degree, but he convinced him to start practicing law and earn the degree later," he added. Justice Kant practiced in the district court of Hisar for one year. In 1985, he moved to Chandigarh to begin his practice at the Punjab and Haryana high court. Later, he completed his master's degree in law in 2011 from the directorate of distance education, Kurukshetra University, while he was a judge at the Punjab and Haryana high court. A high court lawyer stated that justice Kant's achievement was remarkable because he did not come from the "privileged Chandigarh crowd". The lawyer noted that before his elevation as a judge, justice Kant was the "most sought-after" service matters' lawyer in the high court, succeeding purely through hard work. He became the youngest advocate general (AG) of Haryana at the age of 38 years. In 2004, at the age of 42, he was elevated as a judge of the Punjab and Haryana HC. After serving as the HC judge for over 14 years, he was appointed as the chief justice of the Himachal Pradesh high court on October 5, 2018. On May 24, 2019, he became a Supreme Court judge. "I never found him wanting. As a judge, he was courageous and even in dismissal of a petition, he would give some kind of relief to the petitioner," said senior advocate Atul Lakhanpal, who has seen justice Kant scale up the ladder of success. "He is intellectually keen and a serious judge with a strong reformative bent of mind," added another senior advocate, Anupam Gupta. In the high court here, he is credited with many landmark judgments, including the right of jail inmates to have conjugal visits. He was also part of the bench that ordered sanitisation of the Sirsa-based Dera Sacha Sauda in 2017 following the violence that erupted after the imprisonment of dera chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim in rape cases. He also presided over the bench that heard petitions on Punjab's infamous Bhola drug racket case and passed a slew of directions to fight drugs menace in Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh and monitored implementation of the same for years together. A senior lawyer said he was of "unimpeachable character" and that is why he waved through all the "hurdles". "He once shared that a single mistake by him is enough to jeopardize his career as his detractors are always looking for something against him. But he never gave them a chance," the lawyer added, referring to opposition justice Kant faced while being elevated as a judge of the high court and later his elevation as the Supreme Court judge. Back home in Petwar, his brother says justice Kant has a special interest in the environment and wildlife since his early life. He contributed from his own pocket for the rejuvenation of a village pond. His family also runs an NGO and every year justice Kant makes it a point to visit the village for an annual function by the family in which first three toppers of matriculation exam from boys and girls' school of the village are awarded....