Appoint judges to SC, HCs speedily

The recommendation made by the Supreme Court collegium of nine names for appointment as judges of the top court will hopefully end the long impasse that has existed over postings in the court. The collegium, headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana, has forwarded the names, including those of three women judges from High Courts, for approval by the government. It is for the first time that the names of three women judges have been proposed at a time for the Supreme Court, which has historically been dominated by male judges. The need for more women judges at all levels of the judiciary has been pointed out many times, and the Supreme Court will have three of them if the names are accepted. Importantly, Justice Nagarathna of the Karnataka High Court will also go on to become the first woman CJI in 2027, though her tenure will only be for a brief period of over a month.

There has been a severe shortage of judges in the Supreme Court. If all the nine names are approved, the court will be only one short of its full strength of 34 judges. It was two years ago that the strength of the court was increased by Parliament through legislation but the court never had its full complement of judges. The shortage of judges has been more severe in the High Courts and in the lower judiciary. As many as 455 out of 1,098 posts of judges -- about 41% -- are vacant in 25 High Courts even as the number of pending cases is increasing. In some High Courts, more than 50% of the judge posts remain vacant. Once the Supreme Court appointments are done, appointments should be speedily made for the vacant positions in the High Courts and lower courts, too.

There have been no appointments to the Supreme Court since September 2019. A stalemate developed in the collegium because Justice Rohinton Nariman, who was a member and who retired only recently, had insisted on the inclusion of two senior-most judges from the High Courts in the list. One of them is Justice Akil Kureshi, who is the Chief Justice of the Tripura High Court now and whose name the government had turned down for appointment as Chief Justice of the Madhya Pradesh High Court. His name is not in the recommended list now. The collegium system of appointment of judges has its deficiencies, but some judges used to get appointed. But a situation that is internal to the collegium created a stalemate where no appointments were made for a long time. When the recommendations have been made and their approval is likely, there is no good explanation why Justice Kureshi has been left out.