Govt receives messages criticising SC's collegium system of judge appointment: minister tells Parliament

The continuing tussle between the Union government and the Supreme Court over appointment of judges came up in the Parliament on 22 December 2022.

Union Law Minister Kiren Rijiju informed the Rajya Sabha that the government has been receiving representations from many sources alleging lack of transparency, objectivity and social diversity in the collegium system which appoints Supreme Court and High Court judges.

He added that as on 16 December 2022, the Supreme Court had 6 vacancies, and the High Courts had 333 vacancies.

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"While every effort is made to fill up the existing vacancies expeditiously, vacancies of judges in high courts do keep on arising on account of retirement, resignation or elevation of judges and also due to increase in the strength of judges," Rijiju said.

Amid a standoff between the government and the Supreme Court Collegium over the appointment of judges, a parliamentary panel had recently asked the Executive and the Judiciary to come up with an “out of box thinking” to deal with the “perennial problem” of vacancies in high courts.

The committee also said that it is “surprised” to note that the Supreme Court and the government have failed to reach at a consensus on revision of the Memorandum of Procedure for appointment of judges to the Supreme Court and the high courts, though the same is under consideration of both for “about seven years now”.

(With PTI inputs)