Full court! 4 new judges to the Supreme Court

News Bharati    22-May-2019
Total Views |



New Delhi, May 22: Within two weeks of the recommendation by Supreme Court collegium, The government has cleared the names of four judges for their elevation to the Supreme Court.

Once the appointments formally come through, the top court will have its full sanctioned strength of 31 judges (including the chief justice). As of now, the apex court is functioning with 27 judges. 

the Centre has approved the appointments of Justices B R Gavai, Surya Kant, Aniruddha Bose, and A S Bopanna as judges of the Supreme Court. It was on May 8 that the SC collegium recommended the elevation of Justice Gavai from Bombay High Court (Nagpur Bench) and Surya Kant, who is the Chief Justice of Himachal Pradesh High Court.

With the appointment of Justice Gavai, the SC got a judge from the Scheduled Caste community after almost 9 years. Justice Gavai stands at SI.NO8 in the combined seniority list of all HC judges.

Justice Surya Kant, who hails from Punjab and Haryana High Court, was appointed CJ of Himachal Pradesh High Court on October 5, 2018. On May 8 itself, the Collegium had reiterated the proposals for the elevation of Justices Aniruddha Bose( CJ of Jharkhand HC) and A S Bopanna(CJ of Gauhati HC).

This was done on the very next day of the Centre returning the earlier proposal forwarded by the Collegium on April 12 for their elevation. Justice Bose, whose parent High Court is Calcutta, is at number 12 in all-India seniority of judges. Justice Bopanna, whose seniority is number 36, work from Karnataka High Court.