In an unprecedented decision, the Supreme Court Collegium headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) N V Ramana has recommended as many as 68 names in one go for appointment as judges in 12 high courts, including in Allahabad, Rajasthan, and Calcutta, that are facing a severe crunch of judges.
This could be seen as a record number of recommendations by the Supreme Court's Collegium in the recent past to the Centre for appointment of judges in various High Courts.
The Supreme Court Collegium has resolved to reiterate its earlier recommendation for the elevation of three judicial officers as judges in the Allahabad High Court.
If the recommended names are cleared by the Centre, the strength of Allahabad High Court will reach 109 judges in its two benches at Allahabad and Lucknow.
The three judicial officers whose names have been reiterated by the Collegium are Om Prakash Tripathi, Umesh Chandra Sharma, and Syed Waiz Mian.
Besides them, the names of 13 lawyers have also been approved for appointment as judges of the Allahabad High Court.
The 13 lawyers are Chandra Kumar Rai, Shishir Jain, Krishan Pahal, Sameer Jain, Ashutosh Srivastava, Subhash Vidyarthi, Brij Raj Singh, Prakash Singh, Vikas Budhwar, Vikram D Chauhan, Rishad Murtaza, Dhruv Mathur and Vimlendu Tripathi.
Over 1.8 lakh criminal appeals are pending adjudication in the Allahabad High Court, presently having 93 judges against the sanctioned strength of 160.
In the meetings held recently, on August 25 and September 1, the Supreme Court's Collegium considered the names of 112 candidates - 82 from the Bar and 31 from the Judicial Service. Among those 68 cleared for 12 High Courts, 44 are from the Bar and 24 are from the Judicial Service.
The 12 High Courts for which the names were recommended are, Allahabad, Rajasthan, Calcutta, Jharkhand, Jammu and Kashmir, Madras, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Punjab and Haryana, Kerala, Chhattisgarh and Assam.
The Supreme Court Collegium had recently recommended nine probable names to the Supreme Court as judges of the top court, out of which, three are women judges and took oath recently.
The Supreme Court Collegium has recommended the three women judges for elevation to the Supreme Court and they are, Justice B V Nagarathna of the Karnataka High Court; Justice Hima Kohli, Chief Justice of the Telangana High Court; and Justice Bela Trivedi of the Gujarat High Court.
The Supreme Court Collegium consists of five senior-most judges, led by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) Nuthalapati Venkata Ramana, Justices Uday Umesh Lalit, A M Khanwilkar, Dr Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud and L Nageswara Rao.
In an unprecedented decision, the Supreme Court Collegium has recommended as many as 68 names in one go for appointments as judges in 12 high courts, including in Allahabad, Rajasthan and Calcutta, that are facing a severe crunch of judges.
(With inputs from ANI and PTI)
