The Supreme Court is sanctioned with a limit of 34 Judges but has been currently working with only 24 judges. There were 10 vacancies no judicial appointments had taken place since September 2019.
The collegium met on August 17th to decide their recommendations to fill up the vacancies. It published the resolution on 18th August.
The Collegium of the Supreme Court is led by the Chief Justice of India, N.V. Ramana and consists of Justice U.U. Lalit, Justice A.M. Khanwilkar, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice L. Nageswara Rao.
The Collegium has recommended 9 judges and has sent the recommendation to the government.
The recommended names are as follows:
- Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka- (Chief Justice of Karnataka High Court)
- Justice Vikram Nath- (Chief Justice of Gujarat High Court)
- Justice Jitendra Kumar Maheshwari- (Chief Justice of Sikkim High Court)
- Justice Hima Kohli- (Chief Justice of Telengana High Court)
- Justice B.V. Nagarathna- (Judge of Karnataka High Court)
- Justice C.T. Ravikumar- (Judge of Madras High Court)
- Justice M.M. Sundresh- (Judge of Gujarat High Court)
- Justice Bela M. Trivedi- (Judge of Gujarat High Court)
- P.S. Narasimha- (Senior Advocate at Supreme Court)
This the first time 3 women judges are recommended in a single resolution.
If the government approves this resolution, three of the nine- Chief Justice Vikram Nath, Justice Nagarathna and Mr. Narasimha would go on to be the CJIs.
Justice B.V. Nagarathna would go on to be the first woman Chief Justice of India in 2027, if the recommendations are accepted.
Senior Advocate, P.S. Narasimha, who had served as Additional Solicitor General, would become the ninth lawyer appointed directly as judge in the apex courts
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