‘Speak truth, practise righteousness’ relevant even today, CJI tells GNLU grads

Ahmedabad: Justice Surya Kant, the Chief Justice of India (CJI), on Saturday invoked the Taittiriya Upanishad's famous Shikshavalli while addressing the graduating students at the 16th convocation of Gujarat National Law University (GNLU) in Gandhinagar, and told the students that the message of "satyam vada, dharmam chara" is still relevant in today's times."It translates to: Speak truth. Walk in righteousness. For a profession whose legitimacy rests on the bond between truth and justice, those words need no elaboration. They spoke to students stepping into a world that would test them. Centuries passed, and that did not change," the CJI said.
In his graduation address, the CJI said that the legal profession has endured not because it is immune to criticism, but because, across generations, lawyers have understood that credibility is not possessed. It is something you hold in trust. Courts continue to command confidence largely because those who appear before them know that their words carry weight beyond the immediate case, and that reputation is built gradually through consistency rather than fleeting success, he said. He also said that the most rigorous scrutiny that the students will face will not come from "a judge or a colleague, but from the lawyer you have allowed yourself to become".The ceremony was also attended by senior Supreme Court judges, judges from various high courts, and eminent lawyers and legal experts. Degrees were conferred on 295 students: 12 PhD scholars, 89 LLM graduates (63 from the Gandhinagar campus and 26 from the Silvassa campus), and 194 undergraduate LLB (Hons) students.In his address, Prof S Shanthakumar, director of GNLU, elaborated on the activities of the past one year and said that 2025 saw 135 placements, the highest in the university's history, and among the highest for the national law universities (NLUs). The median salary of the students was Rs 18 lakh per annum, he added.The CJI and other senior judges launched the AI-enabled moot court simulator developed at GNLU during the ceremony and also flagged off a mobile legal aid clinic on the occasion.