Shortage of Apex Court judges

The crisis of judges at the Appellate and High Court divisions of the Supreme Court has by now reached acute proportions. According to a report by this newspaper on Saturday, at present there are only six Appellate Division judges for more than 13,000 cases. For the HC division, the numbers are even more worrying: 86 judges for more than 4.31 lakh cases. This situation has been brought on by retirement and passing away of judges, but the problem is not one that could not have been foreseen.

The shortage is the prime reason for the massive backlog of cases that plagues our lower and higher courts. But, the numbers indicate that this problem was not of the making of one day only. The numbers of Appellate judges and HC judges were only 11 in 2009 and 100 in 2012, respectively. Now, the government is talking about promoting HC judges to the apex division, and appointing more judges for the HC. But, our report revealed that in the last one year, the government was asked twice to appoint more judges for the HC. There was ample time to act to avoid this vacuum.

All of these are detrimental to the development of an effective and empowered judicial system. With one judge for more than one lakh people in the country and the pressure of backlogged cases, our hopes of quick disposal of cases cannot be realised. We are glad of the law minister's assurances that the process of appointing new judges is in the horizon. This is an issue of utmost importance for ensuring justice in the country, and should be given due priority. Despite the delay in acting, we hope that the government would now act quickly to fill the gap.