New Delhi: In a move aimed at putting an end to the controversy raised by the Supreme Court’s four senior-most judges, Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra on Thursday announced that the new roster would be made public February 5 onwards.
This would make the allocation of work to the court’s 12 different benches, including the CJI’s who will hear all-important PILs, transparent.
The new roster system has been notified on the Supreme Court website, describing the work allocated to each of the benches headed by the CJI and Justices Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan Lokur, Kurian Joseph, A.K. Sikri, S.A. Bobde, R.K. Agrawal, N.V. Ramana, Arun Mishra, A.K. Goel and Rohinton Nariman. The new roaster will apply to the fresh cases and not the existing ones.
Though, till now, daily, weekly and advance lists of cases are published and put on the website, litigants are not aware before which judge their case will be listed.
Though the CJI has made an attempt to make the roster system transparent, sources told this newspaper that the issue raised by the four judges is yet to be resolved to their full satisfaction.
On January 12, four judges — Justices Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan Lokur and Kurian Joseph — who felt that they were being sidelined in allocation of important cases, called a press conference and alleged that the situation in the Supreme Court was not in order and that many “less than desirable” things had taken place in the last few months.
In an apparent warning, they said lack of impartiality in allocation of high-profile cases, many of which were being given to junior judges, could imperil India’s democracy.
Listing of a case relating to probe into the death of judge B.H. Loya to a bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra had triggered the controversy. Later it was suggested by the four judges that a committee should be set up with the involvement of future Chief Justices to prepare the roster, which should be more transparent and made public.
As per the revised system, the CJI will hear all PILs, election matters, criminal cases, social justice cases, appointment of constitutional functionaries, matters relating to commissions of inquiry, etc. Justice Chelameswar will hear labour, indirect taxes, criminal, consumer protection matters, among others.
Justice Gogoi will hear cases relating to labour, tax laws, company law, criminal matters, excise and liquor issues. Justice Lokur will hear cases relating to ecology and environment, mines and minerals, social justice issues. Justice Joseph will hear matters on labour, rent act, criminal caes, family law, etc. The remaining subjects will be allocated to other benches.
