Govt likely to take call on SC collegium’s recommendations to transfer HC CJs by Thursday

New Delhi, December 29: The government is likely to take a call on the recommendations of the Supreme Court collegium to transfer four chief justices of high courts and elevate five judges to head high courts by the end of this month, sources said on Tuesday.

They said most of the paper work has been completed and a decision could be known by December 31, news agency PTI reported.

In a major reshuffle, the SC collegium had recently recommended to the government the transfer of four Chief Justices (CJs) of high courts including Andhra Pradesh High Court’s Chief Justice J K Maheshwari to the Sikkim High Court, weeks after chief minister Jagan Mohan Reddy had complained to the CJI about the state’s top judiciary.

In an unprecedented move, the Andhra Pradesh chief minister, on October 6, had written to Chief Justice of India (CJI) S A Bobde alleging that the state High Court was being used to “destabilise and topple” his democratically elected government.

The collegium headed by the CJI, in its meeting held on December 14, also recommended elevation of five high court judges as chief justices of different high courts including Justice Dr S Muralidhar, whose notification transferring him to the Punjab and Haryana High Court close to midnight of February 26 had created a huge controversy.

Justice Muralidhar has been recommended to be elevated as Chief Justice of the Orissa High Court.

Justice Muralidhar’s transfer from Delhi High Court to the Punjab and Haryana High Court was notified on the day a bench headed by him had pulled up Delhi Police for failing to register FIRs against three BJP leaders for their alleged hate speeches which purportedly led to the communal violence in northeast Delhi in February.

The collegium had in a meeting on February 12 recommended the transfer of Justice Muralidhar to the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

As per the collegium’s recent recommendations posted on the apex court’s website, besides recommending transfer of Chief Justice Maheshwari to the Sikkim HC it has also recommended the transfer of Sikkim High Court Chief Justice A K Goswami to the Andhra Pradesh HC.

It has approved the proposal to transfer Telangana HC Chief Justice R S Chauhan as Chief Justice of Uttarakhand High Court while Orissa High Court Chief Justice Mohammed Rafiq has been recommended to be sent to the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

Besides them, the collegium has also recommended transfer of Justice Sanjay Yadav from Madhya Pradesh High Court to Allahabad HC, while Justice Vineet Kothari has been sent to Gujarat HC from Madras HC.

Justice Rajesh Bindal has been transferred from Jammu and Kashmir High Court to Calcutta HC, it said,  adding that Justice Joymalya Bagchi has been sent to Andhra Pradesh HC from Calcutta and Justice Satish Chandra Sharma has been sent from Madhya Pradesh HC to Karnataka HC.

Besides Justice Muralidhar , the collegium has also approved the elevation of four judges as Chief Justices of different High Courts.

According to the apex court website, the collegium, in its meeting held on December 14, has also approved the proposal to elevate Delhi HC judge Justice Hima Kohli as Chief Justice of Telangana High Court, and Calcutta HC judge Justice Sanjib Banerjee as Chief Justice of Madras High Court.

Besides them, the collegium has also okayed the proposal to elevate Allahabad HC judge Pankaj Mithal as Chief Justice of Jammu and Kashmir HC and Uttarakhand HC judge Sudhanshu Dhulia as Gauhati HC Chief Justice.

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