Pinnacle court to work out three different CJIs within three months

26-04-2022

India’s top court is predicted to determine three different CJIs serving because the top judge of the country within a brief duration of three months.

The next few months are very crucial for India’s top court because it will see three different Chief Justices of India serving because the top judge of the country within a brief duration of three months. this can be expected to be followed by more vacancies at the highest court as other judges are scheduled to retire within the next few months.

Though this can be not the primary time that the country will see three different CJI’s within such a brief span, this has all over again raised the problem regarding a set tenure for the CJI. There are talks of skyrocketing the tenure of Supreme Court judges to a minimum of three years and also to extend the current retirement age from 65 years to 70 years. 

Such a brief tenure of the judges within the top court that's fighting with the pendency of over three crore cases won't only hamper the possibilities of clearing the backlog but also reduce the probabilities for any CJI to effectively implement new changes and convey in an exceedingly policy which will help in improving the current system.

The present jurist of India, N V Ramana, will retire on August 16, and can be succeeded by Justice U U Lalit, who will assume the office for nearly two months till November 8, followed by Justice D Y Chandrachud, who will assume office for 2 years.

When Justice Chandrachud became the CJI, he, together with his father, would create history because the only father-son duo who became the CJI. Justice D Y Chandrachud’s father, Justice Y V Chandrachud, was the 16th justice of India who served in office from February 1978 to July 1985.

Other judges too will start demitting office as early as May 10 when Justice Vineet Saran will retire as judge of the Supreme Court, followed by Justice L Nageshwara Rao on June 7 and Justice A M Khanwilkar on July 29. 

Justice Indira Banerjee, one in all the sole four women judges within the top court, will retire on September 23 and Justice Hemant Gupta will demit office on October 16.

Currently, there are only two vacancies within the Supreme Court, but this number is anticipated to work out a pointy rise within the coming months. 

The onus is now on this CJI to think about names for elevation in a very timely manner in order that the pendency of the cases, which stood at 70, 362 in step with the last official record, doesn’t go up further.

Indian judges have shorter tenure as compared to the tenure of judges in other countries. 

Judges within the UK and Canada retire at the age of 75 years and 70 years respectively, while in countries like Australia, Belgium and Norway, judges work till the age of 70. 

Interestingly, judges from the us, Russia, New Zealand and Iceland work for a lifetime.