Chennai: Justice V Ramasubramanian, presently the Chief Justice of Himachal Pradesh High Court, has been recommended by the Supreme Court Collegium to the Centre for elevation as a judge of the Apex Court. The Collegiums headed by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi has also recommended three other Chief Justices of various states for elevation, sources said.
They said the three other CJs of state high courts in this list are Justice Krishna Murari (Punjab and Haryana High Court), Justice S Ravindra Bhat (Rajasthan High Court) and Justice Hrishikesh Roy (Kerala High Court). The elevation of these four judges will take the strength of the Apex Court to 34, the highest so far. The Parliament had recently passed the Bill to increase the number of judges in the SC from 31, including the CJI, to 34. President Ram Nath Kovind signed the Bill into law subsequently.
The Parliament move followed a letter written to the Prime Minister by the CJI for increasing the strength of the Apex Court, wherein he had said that due to paucity of judges, the required number of Constitution Benches to decide important cases involving questions of law were not being formed. The 'judge strength of the SC' had been increased from 18 to 26 way back in 1988 and increased again two decades later to 31, including the CJI.
There are 59,331cases pending in the Supreme Court according to a written reply by the Law Ministry to a question in the Rajya Sabha on July 11 (2019).
The President is likely to sign the appointment of the four CJs of state high courts as judges of the Supreme Court within the next couple of days, sources said.
