Prescribe Time Frame For Appointing Judges

Context: Vacancies in the judiciary is aggravated by the disagreements between the Government and Collegium.

Status of vacancies in the judiciary

• Of the total sanctioned strength of 1,080 of 25 High Courts, they have been functioning with only 661, judges leaving 419 vacancies (almost 40%) as of March 1. 
  • Vacancies in five leading High Courts: Patna (60.4%), Calcutta (55.6%), Rajasthan (54%), MP (49.1%) and AP (48.6 %).

Impacts of delays in filling vacancies in the judiciary

• Judicial pendency: According to Granville Austin, speedy resolution of cases seemed to be beyond the capability of the Bench, the Bar and court administrators.
  • Pending cases in the subordinate judiciary increased from 2.92 crores in December 2018 to 3.72 crore at the end of January 2021.
  • The backlog of cases 30 or more years old has increased by 61% in the past two years (till January 2021).
• Affect the quality of judges and justice: Long delays in filling vacancies may demoralize some of the self-respecting aspirants for a judgeship, and they may, and do, opt-out and may ultimately result in deteriorating quality of judges.

Causes for delays in filling vacancies:

• Tussle between judiciary and the government:
  • Through the collegium system, the judiciary took over the power of selecting judges in the hope that the government’s control over their appointments would be a bit loosened.
  • However, the government responded through calculated and motivated delays.

Way forward:  According to Justice Kaul, Government (Executive) and the collegium (judiciary) should modulate their ‘thought process’ to eliminate delays in filling vacancies in the judiciary.

• Executive Actions: Government should speed up verification of antecedents of appointees.
• Judicial Actions:
  • Explore the Provisions of Constitution and statutes: Invoke Article 129 and Article 142(2) of the Constitution and the Contempt of Courts Act to discipline the government and its erring officials.
  • Mandate for timely completion of selection process and appointments:  Prescribe a time frame for completing different stages of the selection process and appointments, to be strictly adhered.