This will be the first time that the Supreme Court of the country will see three Chief Justices in three months. This process of appointment of Chief Justices will run from August to November. Not only this, five judges will also leave the Supreme Court in seven months this year.
In August 2022, the incumbent Chief Justice Justice NV Ramana will retire and will be replaced by Justice Uday Umesh Lalit, the senior-most judge. His tenure will be for two to two and a half months and he will retire after the age of 65 years. In November, Justice DY Chandrachud will become the next Chief Justice of the country. Their tenure will be for a full two years, thus in a short span of three months, three Chief Justices will head the Supreme Court. Justice Lalit Jahan was promoted directly from the lawyer to the Supreme Court. At the same time, Justice Chandrachud is the son of former Chief Justice of the country, Justice YV Chandrachud.
In the case of retirement, Justice Vineet Sharan will retire on May 10, Justice L Nageswara Rao and Justice AM Khanwilkar will retire on June 7 and July 29. Chief Justice Ramana will retire on August 26. Justice Indira Banerjee will retire on September 23. This will reduce the number of women judges in the Supreme Court to three.
After this, Justice Hemant Gupta will leave his office on October 16. As per the seniority norms, Justice Lalit will succeed Justice Ramana as the Chief Justice and will retire on November 8. After this, Justice Chandrachud will become the Chief Justice and he will be the Chief Justice of the country for two full years till November 10, 2024.
pendency of litigation will be affected
While the court was still fixing things after recovering from COVID-19, this wave of retirement will definitely affect the functioning. This wave will have a direct impact on the pendency of litigation. As of April 1, 2022, 70362 cases are pending in the Supreme Court. Of these, 19 per cent of the cases are not maintainable before the benches as they are lying incomplete.
Nine vacancies likely to be created
Now if no new appointment is made in the Supreme Court by November 8, then there will be nine vacancies. As per convention, the Chief Justice cannot make new appointments during the last months of service. In such a situation, the current Chief Justice Justice Ramana will have to make efforts for appointments in May, June and July.
After this, Justice Lalit will have one month left to make appointments, as his tenure is only a little more than two months. One month before retirement, the Chief Justice has to send the name of the next Chief Justice to the government. After making this recommendation, the Chief Justice can sit in the Collegium of Fresh Appointments (the selection board of five senior most judges).