Judicial officers with 7 years of prior law practice eligible for District Judge posts under Bar quota: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Thursday held that a judicial officer, who has seven years of experience as a lawyer prior to joining the judicial service, is entitled to be appointed as a district judge under the Bar quota [Rejanish KV v. K Deepa & Ors].

The judgment was delivered by a bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) BR Gavai and Justices MM Sundresh, Aravind Kumar, Satish Chandra Sharma and K Vinod Chandran. 

"We have held that injustice was meted out to the members of the judicial services, thereby, depriving them from participating in the selection process for the post of district judges by way of direct recruitment," the Court said.

The Court overruled its 2020 ruling in the case of Dheeraj Mor wherein a three-judge bench had barred judicial officers from applying under Bar quota.

The Constitution Bench said the judgment delivered today will be applicable for future appointments and not earlier selections processes, except in cases where interim orders were passed by High Courts or the top court.

"Judicial Officers who have already completed seven years in Bar before they were recruited in the subordinate judicial service would be entitled for being appointed as a District Judge/Additional District Judge in the selection process for the post of District Judges in the direct recruitment process," the Court held.

The Court ordered that the State governments in consultation with the High Courts shall frame rules for direct recruitment of the judicial officers or in-service candidates to the district judge posts.

"All such rules framed by the State Governments in consultation with the High Courts which are not in accordance with the aforesaid answers [in today's judgment] shall stand quashed and set aside," the Court ordered.

The Court ruled the eligibility for appointment as a District Judge is to be seen at the time of application. The Court also held that the judicial officer with a combined experience of seven years as judge and lawyer would also be eligible for appointment to the district judiciary via direct recruitment.

"A person who has been or who is in judicial service and has a combined experience of seven years or more as an advocate or a Judicial Officer would be eligible for being considered and appointed as a District Judge/Additional District Judge under Article 233 of the Constitution," the Court said.

The minimum age for both the advocates and such judicial officers in such recruitments would be 35 years on the date of application, the Court ordered.

It also held that only an advocate/pleader including Government Pleaders and Public Prosecutors or as a judicial officer with "a continuous experience of either an advocate/pleader or a judicial officer or a combination thereof shall only be eligible to be considered for appointment as district judges through the stream of direct recruitment."

On August 12, a three-judge Bench had referred the matter to a Constitution Bench after hearing a review plea against an earlier decision that upheld High Court rules debarring judicial officers from staking their claim as against the posts reserved for direct recruitment from Bar.

Along with the review petitions, many other writ petitions as well as special leave petitions were filed praying for a declaration that even those judicial officers who have an experience of seven years at the Bar prior to their joining as judicial officers would be entitled to be appointed as district judges via direct recruitment under Article 233(2) of the Constitution.

The legal provision states that a person not already in the service of the Union or a State may be appointed as a District Judge only if they have at least seven years of experience as an advocate or pleader and are recommended by the High Court.

The four questions considered by the Court were: 

(i) Whether a judicial officer who has already completed seven years in Bar being recruited for subordinate judicial services would be entitled for appointment as Additional District Judge against the Bar vacancy?

(ii) Whether the eligibility for appointment as a District Judge is to be seen only at the time of appointment or at the time of application or both?

(iii). Whether there is any eligibility prescribed for a person already in the judicial service of the Union or State under Article 233(2) of the Constitution of India for being appointed as District Judge?

(iv). Whether a person who has been Civil Judge for a period of seven years or has been an Advocate and Civil Judge for a combined period of seven years or more than seven years would be eligible for appointment as District Judge under Article 233 of the Constitution of India?

In the judgment delivered today, the Court said that experience the judicial officers gain while working as judges is much greater than the one, a person gains while working as an advocate. It also noted that they are required to undergo rigorous training of at least one year.

Thus, it opined that there is no reason to deny an opportunity to such young talented judicial officers to compete with the advocates/pleaders having seven years’ practice in the matter of direct recruitment to the post of district judge.

"When Government pleaders and Assistant Public Prosecutor who were still practicing in courts were held to be competent to apply for direct recruitment to the post of district judge, can the judicial officers before whom they practice, considered to be inferior. In fact, there is an anomaly insofar as an Assistant Public Prosecutor being entitled to participate in the direct recruitment of district judges, while the judicial officers before whom they argue case are disabled; as interpreted in Dheeraj Mor (supra)," the Court said.

The Court added that if the appointment to the district judges cadre is to be made directly for the purpose of enhancing the efficiency of district judiciary, any interpretation which restricts the competition and prohibits the otherwise meritorious candidates from zone of consideration will have to be eschewed. 

The interpretation which advances the purpose of bringing in efficiency in the district judiciary and permitting a broad-based competition amongst all the eligible candidates will have to be accepted, the Constitution bench said.

The Court rejected the argument that there would be a heartburn amongst the judicial officers in a situation where a junior gets promoted before them.

"The in-service candidates, though junior, will have to compete before being selected with the advocates as also their seniors, who also will be qualified, and only meritorious candidates would be selected and appointed. If a person is meritorious and on account of merit and merit alone gets selected directly as a district judge, there can be no question of heartburn for those who are not as meritorious as persons selected," it said.

The bench also did not agree with the submission that if the in-service candidates are permitted to participate in the recruitment process as direct recruit, then the advocates/pleaders would not be in a position to get selected is concerned, the same is also without any merit.

In a separate but concurring opinion, Justice Sundresh wrote his views on the interpretation of Article 233 of the Constitution of India and the doctrine of separation of powers.

"Under Article 233 of the Constitution, the primacy given to the High Courts, insofar as the mandate for its consultation in appointments to the post of a district judge, along with the control exercised by it over Subordinate Courts under Article 235 of the Constitution, is a classic exhibition of the doctrine of separation of powers," the judge said.

Justice Sundresh opined that Article 233 of the Constitution does not place any fetters on the power of the appointing authority qua the fixation of eligibility criteria for persons in the judicial service, as circumstances might evolve over time, and the wisdom of the Constitutional Courts would take care of it.

The top court judge added that construing Article 233(2) of the Constitution to be a provision meant only for the category of ‘an advocate or a pleader’ would certainly be violative of Article 14 of the Constitution.

Senior Advocates Jayant Bhushan, Arvind P Datar, PS Patwalia, V Giri, Vibha Datta Makhija, Jaideep Gupta, Manish Singhvi, Dama Seshadri Naidu, George Poonthottam, Gopal Sankaranarayanan, Menaka Guruswamy, Rajive Bhalla, Anil Kaushik, Amit Anand Tewari, BH Marlapalle, Narendra Hooda and Anand Sanjay M Nuli represented the petitioners.

Senior Advocates CU Singh, Nidhesh Gupta, Vijay Hansaria, Ravindra Shrivastava, Rajiv Shakdher with advocates Amit Gupta, Kanhaiya Singhal, Rashid N Azam, Sandeep Sudhakar Deshmukh, Sindoora VNL, Yashvardhan, Kavya Jhawar and Nandini Rai appeared for respondents. Advocates Siddharth Gupta and Satyam Chand Soriya appeared the intervenors.

Advocates Ajay Kumar Singh and John Mathew were nodal counsel for the parties.

[Read Judgment]