The Supreme Court created history today after it gave Senior Advocate status to 11 women lawyers in a single day. In the court’s history, only 12 women lawyers so far have been given the status of Senior Advocate.

Under the leadership of Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud, 56 lawyers including the 11 women and 34 first-generation lawyers were given the status of Senior Advocate.

The 11 women lawyers are Shobha Gupta, Swarupama Chaturvedi, Liz Mathew, Karuna Nundy, Uttara Babbar, Haripriya Padmanabhan, Archana Pathak Dave, Shirin Khajuria, NS Nappinai, S Janani, and Nisha Bagchi.

The first-generation lawyers include Amit Anand Tiwari, Saurabh Mishra, and Abhinav Mukherjee.

The decision was taken in a full-court meeting of the Supreme Court today.

Welcoming the decision of giving the status of Senior Advocate to a large number of women lawyers, Additional Solicitor General and Senior Advocate Aishwarya Bhati said this is a historic step of the Supreme Court, and “truly a service to gender justice by recognising the merit of women lawyers, which shows respect for them.”

The Supreme Court had until now given Senior Advocate status to only 14 women – including two retired judges.

In 2019, the Supreme Court had simultaneously given Senior Lawyer status to six women lawyers – Madhavi Dewan, Maneka Guruswamy, Anita Shenoy, Aparajita Singh, Aishwarya Bhati, and Priya Hingorani.

The first lawyer to be made a Senior Advocate by the Supreme Court was Justice Indu Malhotra, who later became a judge of the Supreme Court. Justice Malhotra was nominated in 2007, 57 years after the Supreme Court came into existence.

After this, in 2013, Meenakshi Arora, Kiran Suri and Vibha Dutta Makhija were made Senior Lawyers, taking the number to four.

In 2015, two more women lawyers were nominated – V Mohana and Mahalakshmi Pavani – taking the total to six.

Two retired women high court judges were also nominated later – Justice Sharda Agarwal in 2006, and Justice Rekha Sharma in 2015.

A baby girl was snatched by a Pit Bull dog from her grandfather’s lap and bitten on her leg. A CCTV footage of the Pit Bull attack has been shared with the police.

The one-and-a-half-year-old girl received stitches on many parts of her leg, and suffered three fractures, her parents said.

The incident was reported from Delhi’s Burari on January 2. The girl had been in a hospital for 17 days, where doctors applied 18 stitches. She came home today.

The CCTV footage shows the dog’s owner and six-seven men trying to separate the Pit Bull from the baby. It took almost a minute to pull the baby away.

In a video, the baby girl is seen crying on her mother’s lap, her leg fully wrapped in plaster and bandage.

Her parents alleged the authorities have done nothing to prevent stray menace in the neighbourhood. They alleged no action has been taken despite a complaint to the police.

Pit Bull dogs are banned in India, yet many people keep this temperamental breed as a pet.

The family members alleged some policemen in Burari police station insisted on settling the matter with the dog’s owner. They said the police have not filed a case and the dog’s owner is still roaming around freely.

India will not have to wait too long for a Boeing aircraft that is designed and manufactured in the subcontinent, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said at the inauguration of the plane maker’s engineering centre in Bengaluru today.

The Boeing India Engineering and Technology Centre (BIETC) in Bengaluru is the company’s largest facility outside of the US. It will focus on research and development.

At the event, which was also attended by senior Boeing executives including Chief Operating Officer Stephanie Pope, PM Modi stressed the need to build an aircraft manufacturing ecosystem in India.

“Given that there is so much potential in India, we need to rapidly build an aircraft manufacturing ecosystem in the country,” PM Modi said.

“I proclaimed from the ramparts of the Red Fort – ‘this is the time, this is the right time’. It is also the opportune time for Boeing and other international companies to align their growth with Bharat’s rapid progress. The commitment of 140 crore Indians is now focused on building a developed Bharat in the next 25 years,” PM Modi said.

“With such immense potential in Bharat, we must swiftly establish the aircraft manufacturing ecosystem. Bharat boasts a robust network of MSMEs and a vast talent pool. Coupled with a stable government and a policy approach that encourages ‘Make in India’, this creates a win-win situation for every sector. I believe that the people won’t have to wait long for Boeing’s first fully designed and manufactured aircraft in Bharat,” the Prime Minister said.

BIETC was built at a cost of Rs 1,600 crore on a 43-acre plot at Hightech Defence and Aerospace Park in Devanahalli, on the outskirts of Bengaluru. The facility is expected to become a cornerstone for partnerships with vibrant startups, and private and government ecosystem in India.

Boeing did not give details on the number of people the new facility will employ. Boeing currently employs more than 6,000 people in India across its various centres.

PM Modi also launched the Boeing Sukanya Programme that the company said aims to support the entry of more girl children from across India into the country’s growing aviation sector.

The programme will provide opportunities for girls and women from across India to learn critical skills in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields and train for jobs in the aviation sector, Boeing said in a statement.

“We are honoured and privileged to support Prime Minister Modi’s transformative vision for India, and we are grateful to have him dedicate the Boeing campus to foster aerospace innovation in the country,” said David L Calhoun, Boeing president and CEO.

Boeing has seen a surge in interest for its jets in India, currently the world’s fastest-growing aviation market, with travel demand outstripping the supply of planes.

On Thursday, the aircraft manufacturer received orders for 150 737 MAX narrow-body jets from Akasa Air, India’s youngest carrier.

Boeing has an alliance with Tata Group to produce AH-64 Apache helicopter fuselages and 737 aircraft vertical fin structures.

With inputs from Reuters