Collegium names 4 for Supreme Court judges

The Supreme Court collegium headed by Chief Justice of India T.S. Thakur has recommended the elevation of Chief Justices of three high courts of Allahabad, Madhya Pradesh and Kerala and one senior advocate for appointment as judges of the top court.

The three Chief Justices are D.Y. Chandrachud (61) of the Allahabad high court, A.M. Khanwilkar (58) of the Madhya Pradesh high court at Jabalpur and Ashok Bhushan (60) of the Kerala high court and L. Nageswara Rao, former additional solicitor-general and senior advocate.

According to sources in the Union law ministry, the names received from the collegium will be processed and appointments will be made within a fortnight.

Justices Chandrachud and Khanwilkar both belonged to Maharashtra and Justice Ashok Bhushan belonged to Uttar Pradesh.

Mr Rao hails from Andhra Pradesh. There are already three judges from Maharashtra, viz. Justices S.A. Bobde, Rohinton Nariman and Uday Lalit and with the recommendation of two others, the number of judges from the state will go up to five judges.

The present strength of judges in the apex court is 25 as against the sanctioned strength of 31. With the elevation of three High court chief justices and one senior lawyer the strength will go upto 29.

The last appointment of Justice Amitav Roy to the apex court was made in February 2015. Subsequently no recommendation was made as the Centre enacted the National Judicial Appointments Commission, which was struck down in October 2015. Subsequently it took a few months for the Centre to come out with the Memorandum of Procedure for appointments of Judges and it paved the way for the collegiums to make fresh appointments to the apex court and to various High Courts.