New Delhi: There are eight judges’ empty post in the Supreme Court, the government told Lok Sabha on Wednesday.
Next month, two more judges will retire – Judge Rohinton Fali Nariman and Navin Sinha – who will take total vacancies in the APEX court to more than 29% of the sanction power of 34 judges.
The recruitment rate of Judge SC was almost stopped with no one appointed in the last one for one and a half years of pandemic.
From 8 to 10 promises of the position of Judge SC every year, not a single judge who was appointed since the beginning of 2020, before locking the induced pandemic disrupted the judicial function.
25 High Courts in this country face the same situation with total vacancies accumulated in 454 as against the power approved 1,098 judges.
In a written answer to the question in LS, Law Minister Kiren Rijiju told that the recruitment rate in the High Court had slowed too – of the 108 judges appointed in 2018 to 66 in 2020.
Higher courts not only faced difficulties in migration to format Electronic delivery of justice but almost all HC colleagium has failed to recommend candidates to fill Judicial vacancies in the specified time frame.
Vacancies in the subordinate court stand in 5,132, said minister.
“The Ministry of Justice writes from time to time to general registrars from all high courts to speed up filling vacancies under the supervision mandated by the case of Malik Mazhar,” Rijju said.
For the recruitment of judges in a higher court, the minister said that “every effort was made to accelerate the process of appointment of judges after the legal procedure”.
In the past year, the government has notified an appointment of less than 10% of the total vacancies in the High Court, according to the Ministry of Law.
The worst affected has become Allahabad HC where 66 posts judges are empty but only seven have been filled in the previous 12 months.