The petition was dismissed as "without merit" by the vacation bench of the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a petition seeking the quashing of Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar's appointment as the next Chief Justice of India.
Mr Khehar will take over as the Chief Justice of India on January 4 when the incumbent Chief Justice TS Thakur demits office.
The vacation bench of Justice RK Agrawal and Justice DY Chandrachud dismissed as "without merit" the petition by the National Lawyers Campaign for Judicial Transparency and Reforms (NLCJTR) and others.
President Pranab Mukherjee on December 19 appointed Mr Khehar as the 44th Chief Justice of India.
Justice TS Thakur retires on January 3.
Rejecting the contentions by the NLCJTR and others, the Court noted the part of the petition which said: "Khehar, undoubtedly, is one of the most upright judges of the Supreme Court; the petitioners are all proud of his Lordship... Nobody could point a finger at him when it comes to his honesty, integrity and uprightness. His Lordship is a real diamond in that sense."
The Court in its order dismissing the petition said that besides the CJI, four seniormost judges of the top court are members of the collegium that recommends names for the appointment of judges to the top court and the high courts.
The Court also rejected the contention by the petitioners that Mr Khehar was the biggest beneficiary of the October 16, 2015, constitution bench judgment which held unconstitutional the constitution's 99th amendment that paved the way for the NJAC and the NJAC Act itself.
The petitioners had contended that Mr Khehar by heading the five-judge constitution bench and authoring the judgment by which NJAC was aborted, had usurped the appointment process thereby ensuring his appointment as the Chief Justice of India and "ruling out, may be, distant possibility of the NJAC which would consist of two eminent persons appointing Justice Chelameswar or any other tall judge as the next Chief Justice of India".
While acknowledging that Mr Khehar was "eminent in all respect", the petitioners had told the court that "the CJI is a judicial statesman and the judge for whom I may have highest respect may not be fit to be the CJI", petitioner's counsel Mathews J Nedumpara told the bench