New Delhi :The 22-month-long impasse finally ends with the Supreme Court Collegium headed by chief Justice of India NV Ramana recommending nine High Court judges including CT Ravi Kumar from Kerala, for appointment as top court judges. The recommendation was conveyed to government on Tuesday.
In a first, the Collegium list has three women judges - Justice BV Nagarthna of Karnataka High court, Justice Hma Kohli, chief Justice of the Telangana High Court and Justice Bela Trivedi of the Gujarat High Court,
Notably, the headway ending unprecedentedly long impasse comes just days after retirement of Justice Rohinton Nariman from the Supreme Court. He had stood grounded on his demand that no consensus was possible unless the two most senior judges in the all-India seniority list for high court judges – Karnataka High Court ChiefJustice Abhay Oka and Tripura High Court Chief Justice Akil Kureshi –were recommended first.
Incidentally, Justice Oka has been picked by the Collegium and so have Justices Vikram Nath and JK Maheswari – The Chief Justices of Gujarat and Sikkim High courts respectively.
Justice Oka, who is currently the most senior high court judge in the country, is known for his rulings on civil liberties. During the pandemic, several of Oka’s rulings in Bombay High Court protected the rights of migrant workers in Mumbai and also questioned the state government’s handling of the pandemic.
Justice Nath too questioned the state government’s management of Covid in Gujarat,. Addressing issues like lack of hospital beds and shortage of emergency medicines. The judge was also first-ever to live stream court hearings on Covid crisis on YouTube.
Justice Maheswari, former Chief Justice of Andhra Pradesh High Court, was transferred to Sikkim in December 2020 after the Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy accused a senior judge of the Supreme court of interfering in the functioning of the High Court to topple his government.
Justice CT Ravikumar, is the second most senior judge of the Kerala High court, and Justice MM Sundaresh, the third most judge of the Madras High court, are the other recommendations in the list and picked from the Bar, is former Additional Solicitor Gneral PS NNariasmha who appeared in several prominent cases including the Ram Janmabhoomi case.
