43% of high court judges posts vacant, backlog of cases may hit 1-crore mark by year-end

Source:- indiatimes.com

NEW DELHI: Despite the best efforts to speed up disposal of cases, pendency in the high courts may spiral to a monstrous one crore cases by the end of this year from the present 45 lakh cases as 24 HCs are functioning at present with 43% vacancies with only 599 judges as against a sanctioned strength of 1044.

The disposal of cases suffered as the process for appointment of judges came to a standstill for almost a year because of the Constitutional tug-of-war between the Legislature and Judiciary over the validity of National Judicial Appointments Commission, which was scrapped by the Supreme Court.

The SC too has five vacancies and last one to be appointed was Justice Amitava Thakur on February 27 last year. The SC has a pendency of around 60,000 cases, HCs have 45 lakh cases and trial courts around 2.75 crore cases making it a total of around 3.25 crore cases. Judges fear that it might touch 4 crore cases by the end of this year because of large number of vacancies.

The SC had revived the collegium system, in which a CJI-headed group of judges chooses persons for appointment as judges on recommendation of a similar collegium in the HCs. But it is expected to resume functioning only by the beginning of February after the Centre finalizes the memorandum of procedure in consultation with Chief Justice T S Thakur.

Even if the collegium gets on with the task of selecting persons for appointment as judges, filling 445 vacancies would take a long time, may be more than a year. By that time more judges would retire throwing the judiciary into a complex web of pendency caused by the huge number of vacancies.

But this is just the beginning of the problem for judiciary and its newly appointed captain in CJI Thakur. The Centre is finalizing the memorandum of procedure (MoP) for selecting HCs and SC Judges and it could change many rules that had been entrenched into the system since 1998, when the Judiciary had decided to make itself the sole selector of judges erasing Constitutionally prescribed Executive’s role.

For years, judges for the Supreme Court have been selected from among the Chief Justices of the high courts mainly on the basis of their seniority. Except a few, the senior-most among them have all been appointed as judges of the SC. But, the Centre wants this to change.

It feels that merit should get as much consideration as seniority among the Chief Justices of the HCs. It also wants to insert in the MoP a clause that a high court judge with outstanding merit and ability to do justice should be appointed as a SC judge ahead of the CJs of HCs. This departure from tradition could cause severe heart-burns and disappointment among many CJs aspiring to become a judge of the apex court.

In selection of persons for appointment as HC judges, the Centre wants to broad-base the process. Till now, the names have been suggested by the collegium headed by HC CJ. But, the Centre wants that all other judges should be permitted to suggest names of advocates and district judges whom they consider ‘outstanding’. The MoP also provides that the process for filling vacancies must commence six months prior to the retirement of a judge.

But, one major point that needs sorting out is the transparency in the selection of the judges to the SC and HCs. Should the Right to Information Act apply to the process as it rolls on or should it apply only after the process gets over and names get recommended to the government for appointment as judges?

But, one major point that needs sorting out is the transparency in the selection of the judges to the SC and HCs. Should the Right to Information Act apply to the process as it rolls on or should it apply only after the process gets over and names get recommended to the government for appointment as judges?

Times View

Over 40% of positions of Justices of high courts remaining vacant is simply not acceptable. One of the most fundamental duties of a state to its citizens is the delivery of justice. A situation in which justice is often too delayed to be meaningful cannot be allowed to continue. TOI has consistently campaigned for vacancies to be filled and pending cases to be urgently tackled. The stand-off between the judiciary and the executive on how judges are to be appointed has clearly not helped, but the vacancies must be filled, the sooner the better.