In a major reversal of the nearly two decades-old judicial transfer policy that the Chief Justice of an High Court must be from outside the State, the Supreme Court collegium has recommended that Nisar Ahmad Kakru, who hails from Jammu and Kashmir, be posted as Chief Justice of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court.
Justice Kakru was made Chief Justice of the Andhra Pradesh High Court only in February. The present Chief Justice of the J&K High Court, Aftab Hussain Saikia, is being sent back to the Gauhati High Court as its Chief Justice. Justice Saikia belongs to Assam . Chief Justice of the Gauhati High Court Madan Lokur is being shifted to the Andhra Pradesh High Court.
Elevation
Normally, senior High Court judges are elevated as Chief Justices of other High Courts when they are due for elevation.
In a departure from this practice, the collegium — comprising Chief Justice of India S.H. Kapadia and Justices Altamas Kabir, R.V. Raveendran, Dalveer Bhandari and D.K. Jain — at a meeting here on September 9, decided to post the senior High Court judge, who is due for elevation as Chief Justice to the High Court concerned few months before the retirement of present incumbent and then to elevate him soon after the retirement of the Chief Justice concerned.
Accordingly Justice Ranjan Gogoi of the Gauhati High Court has been shifted as a judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and he is expected to be elevated as Chief Justice in January next when the present Chief Justice Mukul Mudgal retires. Justice Arun Kumar Misra of the Madhya Pradesh High Court has been shifted to the Rajasthan High Court to succeed Chief Justice Jagdish Bhalla, who is due to retire on October 31.
Senior-most judge of the Andhra Pradesh High Court Justice T. Meenakumari is being sent to the Patna High court. Justice D.S.R. Varma of the Andhra Pradesh High Court is also being shifted.
The collegium also approved the transfer of 12 judges of various High Courts, some for administrative reasons and others in ‘public interest' following complaints or after making independent enquiries.
Informed sources told The Hindu that initially 28 judges were identified from various High Courts for being shifted.
Request rejected
Of them, 12 were selected at the first instance and their views were sought on the proposed transfers. Though they said they would accept the transfer, some of them wanted to be shifted to the nearby High Court of their choice.
But, according to sources, the request was considered and rejected and the original transfer proposal was approved by the collegium and forwarded to the Union Law Ministry.
According to sources in the Law Ministry, the 12 High Court judges sought to be shifted included three Punjab and Haryana High Court judges — Justice Ashutosh Mohunta to the Andhra Pradesh High Court; Justice Vinod Kumar Sharma to the Madras High Court and Justice H.S. Bhalla to the Orissa High Court.
Justice M. Jeyapaul of the Madras High Court is being sent to the Punjab and Haryana High Court. The other transfers are two judges each from Delhi and Allahabad High Courts; one each from the Patna and Orissa High Courts.
