Judges' children must meet higher benchmark for appointment in high courts, says SC c
Judges' children must meet higher benchmark for appointment in high courts, says SC collegium member
M.U.H
09/01/202524
A senior Supreme Court collegium member has proposed that sitting or former judges' lawyer children must meet a higher benchmark for appointment as high court judges, according to a report by Times of India.
This proposal comes after a senior top court judge proposed to pause for some years such appointments. Some lawyers had a long grievance that first-generation lawyers generally get ignored when bracketed in a zone of consideration for HC judgeship with kith and kin of sitting or former constitutional court judges.
According to the TOI report, the senior member of the SC collegium said it would be discriminatory to completely bar such candidates’ selection when judicial appointments are based only on merit and suitability.
“He also felt that it could deprive the constitutional courts of the talent it needs to deal with litigation, which is getting complex with the passage of time. However, the SC judge agreed with the objective of the initial proposal of another judge given the resentment among lawyers. He also emphasised that many such selections were deserving cases,” sources told TOI.
The SC collegium member proposed a higher threshold in the selection criteria for such candidates keeping in view the facilities and experience they can get without the grind first-generation lawyers go through in the acutely competitive legal profession.
The lawyers’ grievance was reportedly reflected during the “full court reference” on Wednesday to pay homage to three former SC judges – Justices Kuldip Singh, M Jagannadha Rao and H S Bedi – who passed away.
All three judges’ sons became HC judges. One of whom resigned within six months of his appointment to return to legal practice in SC. In one case, the deceased SC judge’s father was also a judge, according to TOI.
Meanwhile, the SC on Thursday slammed a lawyer for insinuating that relatives’ of judges were being designated as senior advocates by courts, and asked him as to how many judges he can name whose offspring got the title.
Terming his allegations as 'scurrilous and unfounded', a bench of Justices B R Gavai and K V Viswanathan expressed its serious discontent with the plea against the conferment of senior designations to lawyers.
