Of 221 names recommended for HC judgeship since Nov 2022, 29 pending with Centre

New Delhi: In a first of its kind move towards enhancing transparency, the Supreme Court has declared the names of judges recommended by the collegium, their relations to sitting or retired judges of high courts or the apex court and the number of resolutions confirmed by the government.

According to the data released by the Supreme Court from November 9, 2022 to November 10, 2024 -- a time when former Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud was at the helm of affairs -- of the 303 candidates approved by the Supreme Court collegium for appointment as high court judges, 170 have been cleared by the central government. The data shows 17 names are still pending with the government for approval.

Out of the 303 names recommended, 12 were related to former or retired judges of the high court or the Supreme Court and one name who had relations with the retired or serving member of the high court or the apex court, was not cleared by the Centre.

Seven of the 303 names belonged to the Scheduled Caste category, five to Scheduled Tribe community, 21 to Other Backward Classes, seven to Backward Classes, 28 women and 23 from minority community.

Similarly, the data from November 11, 2024, to May 5, 2025, with Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna at the helm, a total of 103 candidates were recommended for judgeship in high courts by the apex court collegium, out of which 51 names have been approved.

The data says that 12 names are still pending approval of the Union government and only two candidates have relations with retired or sitting judges of the Supreme Court or the high court.

Of the 103 candidates, 11 are from Other Backward Classes, one from Scheduled Caste, two from Scheduled Tribe, eight from minority communities and six are women.

Of 221 names approved by the Collegium for judgeship in the high courts since November 9, 2022 to May 5, 2025, the names of 29 candidates are pending approval of the Centre.

Only 14 of the 221 candidates were related to retired or serving members of the high court or the Supreme Court.

Besides these data, the top court has also also placed the complete process of appointments to the high courts and the Supreme Court, including the role assigned to the High Court Collegium, the role of and inputs received from the state governments, Union of India and consideration by the Supreme Court Collegium, on its website for the knowledge and awareness of the public.

"The proposals approved by the Supreme Court Collegium for appointments as high court judges during the period from November 9, 2022 to May 5, 2025, including the names, high court, source -- whether from service or Bar, date of recommendation by the Supreme Court Collegium, date of notification by the Department of Justice, date of appointment, special category (SC/ST/OBC/Minority/Woman) and whether the candidate is related to any sitting or retired High Court/Supreme Court judge, have also been uploaded on the Supreme Court website," the statement issued by the Supreme Court on Monday night has said.