New Delhi, Oct 30 Former Supreme Court judge Ranjana Prakash Desai, appointed by the apex court on Friday as the sole mediator in the Krishna-Godavari basin gas migration dispute involving Reliance Industries, was the preferred choice of several state governments to head committees drafting a Uniform Civil Code (UCC).
Justice Desai’s appointment as the sole mediator by the Chief Justice of India Surya Kant-led bench in the high-value dispute involving the Centre and the Reliance-BP-Niko combine came on her 77th birthday.
Born on October 30, 1949, Justice Desai graduated in arts from Elphinstone College in 1970. She took her law degree from Government Law College, Bombay, in 1973 and joined the legal profession the same year.
She was elevated to the Bombay High Court bench on April 15, 1996, and to the Supreme Court on September 13, 2011. She retired on October 29, 2014.
Over the past few years, Justice Desai has been entrusted with the responsibility of heading committees constituted by state governments to examine, formulate and recommend a UCC.
Her association with the UCC exercise began with Uttarakhand, where she headed the expert committee that prepared the state's legislation.
Later, she was entrusted with similar assignments in Gujarat, Maharashtra and West Bengal.
Justice Desai was appointed chairperson of the five-member expert committee constituted by the Uttarakhand government in May 2022 to prepare a report on the implementation of a UCC in the state.
The report later formed the basis of the legislation which came into force on January 27, 2025, making Uttarakhand the first state to implement such a code.
She subsequently headed the high-level committee constituted by the Gujarat government on a UCC.
Based on the panel's recommendations, the Gujarat assembly passed the UCC bill, which received presidential assent in September this year.
In July 2026, Maharashtra appointed Justice Desai to head a seven-member committee tasked with preparing a framework and recommendations for implementing a UCC in the state.The panel is expected to submit its report within six months.
The same month, she was appointed chairperson of a nine-member committee constituted by the West Bengal government to examine and review the draft UCC for the state.
After retirement, Justice Desai headed the Delimitation Commission for Jammu and Kashmir and was later appointed chairperson of the Press Council of India in 2022.
