Supreme Court Collegium to hold interactions with 33 candidates for Allahabad High Court

The Supreme Court Collegium headed by the Chief Justice of India BR Gavai will hold interactions with 33 candidates for filling up vacancies in the Allahabad High Court.

According to highly placed sources, these interactions are slated to take place on Monday.

The interactions will be held with 20 judicial officers and 13 lawyers who are in the fray for High Court judgeship.

The Allahabad High Court has a sanctioned strength of 160 judges but is currently operating at half its strength. With three impending transfers, the vacancy will come down to 77.

The three judges proposed by the Collegium to be transferred are - Justive Sanjay Kumar Singh, Justice Rohit Ranjan Agarwal and Justice Donadi Ramesh.

The same is awaiting clearance by the Central government.

The Supreme Court collegium had recently also recommended the appointment of 14 advocates as Bombay High Court judges.

The Collegium has been pushing to fill vacancies in High Courts across the country. So far 60 vacancies have been filled in different High Courts

Recently, the Allahabad High Court had sought the response of the State on a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) petition seeking directions for urgent and time-bound filling of judicial vacancies at the High Court.

The plea stated that with a population of 24 crore and 1,155,225 pending cases before the High Court, there is only one judge for every 30 lakh people, with each judge handling an average of 14,623 pending cases.