The Supreme Court Collegium has recommended the appointment of eight judicial officers, including three women, as judges of the Delhi High Court, which is functioning with 16 vacancies against a sanctioned strength of 60.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court Collegium has recommended the elevation of eight judicial officers, including three women, as judges of the Delhi High Court, in a move aimed at easing the vacancy position in one of the country’s busiest High Courts.
The recommendation was made on Thursday. All eight persons recommended are from the judicial service, that is, serving judicial officers of the Delhi Higher Judicial Service, rather than from the Bar.
The eight officers recommended
The judicial officers recommended for appointment as judges of the Delhi High Court are Gurvinder Pal Singh, Nivedita Anil Sharma, Nisha Sahay Saxena, Sanjay Sharma-I, Bharat Parashar, Dr. Aditi Choudhary, Dinesh Bhatt and Arun Bhardwaj. Of these, Arun Bhardwaj is the incumbent Registrar General of the Delhi High Court.
The inclusion of three women among the eight recommended is notable at a time when the representation of women on the higher judiciary remains a subject of sustained attention, with successive Chief Justices and the Collegium having spoken of the need to improve gender diversity on the Bench.
The vacancy position
The recommendation comes against a significant shortfall in the working strength of the Delhi High Court. The Court has a sanctioned strength of 60 judges but is currently functioning with 44, leaving a vacancy of 16. If the eight recommendations are cleared and the officers appointed, the working strength would rise to 52, still short of the sanctioned figure but a substantial reduction in the shortfall.
Judicial vacancies have a direct bearing on the pace at which cases are heard and disposed of, and the Delhi High Court, which handles a heavy and varied docket, has among the larger sanctioned strengths of the country’s High Courts. Filling a meaningful proportion of the vacant posts in one recommendation is therefore of practical significance for litigants awaiting hearings.
How the appointment process works
A Collegium recommendation is a step in, not the conclusion of, the appointment process. Judges of the High Courts are appointed by the President under Article 217 of the Constitution, on the recommendation of the Supreme Court Collegium, which for High Court appointments comprises the Chief Justice of India and the two senior-most judges of the Supreme Court, after the proposal has moved up from the High Court Collegium concerned.
Once the Supreme Court Collegium makes its recommendation, the names are forwarded to the Union Government, and the appointment is notified only after the Government processes and clears them. The recommendation announced on Thursday therefore sets the process in motion; the actual elevation of the eight officers will follow the completion of that process. As the persons recommended are all serving judicial officers, their elevation would also reflect the established practice of drawing a share of the High Court Bench from the judicial service alongside those elevated from the Bar.
Why it matters
Beyond the immediate arithmetic of vacancies, the recommendation is a marker of the Collegium’s continuing effort to keep the High Courts adequately staffed, an effort that has been the subject of frequent public comment given the persistent gap between sanctioned and working strengths across the country. Each such recommendation, if cleared expeditiously by the Government, translates directly into additional judicial capacity and, in turn, faster disposal for the thousands of matters pending before the Court.
The presence of three women among the eight, and the elevation of a serving Registrar General, also speak to the composition of the Bench the Collegium is seeking to build, one that draws on administrative and judicial experience within the system and that incrementally improves gender representation. Whether all eight names are cleared, and how quickly, now rests with the Union Government, and the working strength of the Delhi High Court will depend on the pace at which the recommendations are acted upon.
