Judges from other States: Delhi and Karnataka High Courts have highest followed by Patna, Calcutta, Allahabad, Madras

The recent transfers in the higher judiciary have resulted in a massive reshuffle across the High Courts, impacting the intra-court seniority of judges and composition of the respective Collegiums.

Bar & Bench takes a look at how recent transfers have changed the composition of 25 High Courts.

The number of transferee judges analaysed in this piece does not include the High Court Chief Justices who are usually not from their parent High Courts, in accordance with the norms.

Delhi and Karnataka High Courts at present have the highest number of judges from outside the State – seven. In both the High Courts, the Collegium now has only one local judge.

As far as Delhi High Court is concerned, the rejig is significant as it comes just days after an in-house committee indicted its former judge Justice Yashwant Varma in the case pertaining to the discovery of cash at his residence.

Before the recent transfers, Delhi High Court had only two judges from outside - Justice Subramonium Prasad from Madras High Court and Justice Purushaindra Kaurav from the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

The number increased to seven on July 14 when Centre cleared the Supreme Court recommendation for more transfers to Delhi High Court.

Justices Nitin W Sambre, Vivek Chaudhary, Anil Kshetarpal, Arun Monga and Om Prakash Shukla were transferred to Delhi.

Since most of these judges are senior to the majority of judges at Delhi High Court, their appointments have altered the intra-court seniority and also impacted the composition of the Collegium.

Before the transfers, Justice Prathiba M Singh was a part of the Collegium along with Chief Justice DK Upadhyaya and Justice Vibhu Bakhru.

The position of Justice Bakhru, who has been elevated and transferred as Chief Justice of Karnataka High Court, has been filled by Justice V Kameswar Rao in the Collegium on his return from Bengaluru.

Since Justice Sambre is senior to Justice Singh, it has meant she is no longer a part of Collegium at present. She is now fifth in seniority after Justice Chaudhary.

Similarly, Justices Dinesh Kumar Singh (of Allahabad) and Jayant Banerji (of Allahabad) were recently transferred to the Karnataka High Court.

It also has Justice Anu Sivaraman from Kerala, Justice Lalitha Kanneganti from Andhra Pradesh, Justice Perugu Sree Sudha from Telangana, Justice Dr Chillakur Sumalatha from Telangana and Justice K Manmadha Rao from Andhra Pradesh.

Justice Sivaraman is the senior-most judge at Karnataka High Court after Chief Justice Vibhu Bakhru. She was part of the Collegium even before the recent transfers.

Pertinently, Justices Sumalatha and Kanneganti have been recommended for transfer to Telangana but the Central government is yet to clear the Collegium decision. 

Before these two High Courts, Patna High Court had the highest number of judges from outside.

At present, six judges from other High Courts posted at Patna include Justices Pavankumar Bhimappa Bajanthri (of Karnataka), Justice Arvind Singh Chandel (of Chhattisgarh), Justice Bibek Chaudhari (of Calcutta), Justice Nani Tagia (of Gauhati), Justice Annireddy Abhishek Reddy (of Telangana) and Justice Gunnu Anupama Chakravarthy (of Telangana).

Out of these, Justice Annireddy Abhishek Reddy has been recommended to be repatriated to Telangana but the Supreme Court Collegium recommendation has not yet been cleared by the Central government.

Justice Bajanthri is part of the Collegium at the High Court.

The next on the list is Calcutta High Courts where five judges have been posted from outside.

Justice Sujoy Paul (of Madhya Pradesh) and Justice Lunusungkum Jamir (from Gauhati) were recently transferred to Calcutta.

Justice Madhuresh Prasad (from Patna), Justice Dinesh Kumar Sharma (from Delhi) and Justice Gaurangh Kanth (from Delhi) were already posted at Calcutta High Court.

Justice Paul is part of the Collegium at the High Court.

Allahabad has four judges posted from outside.

Justice Arindam Sinha (of Calcutta), Justice Shekhar B Saraf (from Calcutta), Justice Manoj Bajaj (from Punjab & Haryana) and Justice Donadi Ramesh (from Andhra Pradesh) were already posted in Uttar Pradesh before the recent rejig.

Similarly, Madras High Court also has four judges on transfer from other High Courts.

Justice Hemant Chandagoudar (from Karnataka), Justice Shamim Ahmad (from Allahabad), Justice Mummineni Sudheer Kumar (from Telangana) and Justice Kasoju Surendhar @ K Surender (from Telangana) were posted at the Madras High Court before the recent transfers.

In the recent 22 transfers recommended by Supreme Court Collegium, Justice T Vinod Kumar of Telangana is also to take over as a judge at the Madras High Court. However, despite a notification for the same by the Ministry of Law and Justice, Justice Kumar is yet to join at his new place of posting.

Punjab & Haryana High Court and Kerala High Court have three judges each from outside. 

Justice Ashwani Kumar Mishra (from Allahabad) was recently transferred to Chandigarh and is now part of the High Court Collegium. Justice Anoop Chitkara (from Himachal Pradesh) and Justice Lapita Banerji (from Calcutta) were already posted there. Two judges posted there from outside were repatriated to their parent High Courts on July 14.

Kerala High Court already had three judges posted there from other High Courts - Justice Amit Rawal (from Punjab and Haryana), Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari from Madhya Pradesh) and Justice Krishnan Natarajan (from Karnataka).

Bombay, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Telangana and Orissa have two judges each from outside the State.

Among them, Justice Shree Chandrashekhar (from Jharkhand), Justice Puthichira Sam Koshy (from Chhattisgarh) and Justice Manash Ranjan Pathak (from Gauhati) are part of the collegium at Bombay, Telangana and Orissa respectively.

Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Tripura High Courts have one judge each from outside.

Justice Ravi Nath Tilhari (from Allahabad) and Justice Todupunuri Amarnath Goud (from Telangana) are part of the collegium at Andhra Pradesh and Tripura High Courts respectively.

Chhattisgarh, Gauhati, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh, Jharkhand, Manipur, Meghalaya, Sikkim and Uttarakhand High Courts do not have any judges from outside except their Chief Justices.