For the first time, the Karnataka State Bar Council (KSBC) has held a special meeting with senior advocates to discuss the large number of vacancies of judges in the Karnataka High Court.
Terming the vacancies “a serious issue”, the meeting on Saturday unanimously passed a resolution urging the Chief Justice of the High Court to take “urgent steps to fill the posts by appointing suitable and competent members of the Bar immediately.”
Presiding over the meeting, KSBC chairman C.R. Gopalaswamy pointed out that 14 of the total 50 sanctioned posts were vacant and it would go up to 17 in the next couple of weeks. If the Union government’s decision to increase the strength to 62 took effect, there would be 29 vacant posts, he said while pointing out that the elevation to the posts of judges from the cadre of practising advocates had not been carried out after 2010.
Though the senior advocates unanimously said there was no difficulty in the present practice of informally considering religion, caste or sub-caste of advocates in the selection process, they felt that the issue was about “selection of right candidate” from these communities as of late questions were being raised about the “conduct and character” of persons considered for these posts.
The former Advocate-General A.N. Jayaram said the collegium system was complicated because of its secret selection process and suggested that the Council write a letter to the Chief Justice of India requesting him to advise Chief Justices of High Courts to have wider consultation process before selecting members of the Bar as judges.
Making it clear that they were confronting with the judiciary in this issue, another former Advocate-General B.V. Acharya said the delay in appointments indicated “failure of the collegium system.” Y. Sadashiva Reddy, K.N. Putte Gowda and other advocates said there was no difficulty in giving weight to community, but “unfit” candidates could not be chosen from any community as competent and suitable advocates were available in every section of society. They felt the need for the members of the bar to protest, like the Madras Bar Association, whenever “unfit” persons were chosen.
Senior advocate Pramila Nesargi said there was a need for selecting more number of women advocates to the posts in proportion to the number of practicing women advocates.
