THE APPOINTMENT of eight High Court Chief Justices on September 5, 2026 came amid controversy over the functioning of the Collegium. Justice Sandeep Mehta had written to Chief Justice of India (‘CJI’) Surya Kant on August 2, 10 and 17, alleging maladministration, corruption, nepotism and favoritism by Rajasthan’s then Acting Chief Justice, Sanjeev Prakash Sharma.
In a fourth letter dated August 30, he reportedly complained of inaction on the earlier letters. The CJI, in response, stated that the concerns were under examination and that Justice Sharma deserved a fair hearing. Justice Sharma, meanwhile, denied all the allegations and attributed them to animosity. Irrespective of its merit, the episode brought anxious attention back to the Supreme Court Collegium (‘SCC’).
Justice Sharma had assumed acting charge on September 28, 2025 following the retirement of Chief Justice K.R. Shriram. The SCC had earlier declined his request for repatriation to Rajasthan on health grounds but transferred him to the Rajasthan High Court in May 2025 without disclosing the reasons. He thereafter continued as Acting Chief Justice for nearly a year. Justice Sanjay Kumar Agrawal was recommended as the regular Chief Justice only on August 31, 2026, 337 days after Sharma assumed charge, and took oath on September 7. Rajasthan thus remained without a regular Chief Justice for 344 days, almost the entire period preceding the Collegium’s recommendation.
1. The First Question: Departure from the MoP
The first question concerns the apparent departure from the Memorandum of Procedure (‘MoP’). As a matter of policy, a Chief Justice is appointed from outside the High Court. Paragraph 3 therefore provides that puisne judges are “ordinarily” considered for appointment as Chief Justice of other High Courts, while Paragraph 4 carves out the only exception to this general rule. A puisne judge who has one year or less to retire when his turn for elevation arrives may be considered for appointment as Chief Justice of his own High Court, provided a vacancy is due to arise there within that period. When Justice Shriram retired, Justice Sharma was Rajasthan’s senior-most puisne judge and was due to retire on September 26, 2026, slightly less than a year later. It is not publicly known whether the SCC considered invoking this permissive exception in his case. It nevertheless means that neither Sharma’s remaining tenure nor the outside-Chief-Justice policy explains an acting arrangement lasting almost a year. If he was not to be appointed, another successor should have been identified in time.
Paragraph 5 requires the CJI to initiate the proposal sufficiently early to ensure completion of the process at least one month before an anticipated vacancy. It also requires simultaneous succession where a Chief Justice is transferred and states that an acting arrangement should ordinarily not continue for more than one month. Following consultation, the recommendation is sent to the Union Law Minister, who obtains the views of the concerned State Government and places the proposal before the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister then advises the President. How far this procedure was followed in Rajasthan remains unanswered.
The transfer of Justice Atul Sreedharan also reminds of previous departures with absolute lack of transparency. On August 25, 2025, the Collegium recommended his transfer from Madhya Pradesh to Chhattisgarh. On October 14, it changed the destination to Allahabad “on reconsideration sought by the Government”. The transfer was notified on October 18, and he took oath on November 11.
Earlier that year, a Bench comprising Justices Sreedharan and Anuradha Shukla had directed registration of an FIR against Madhya Pradesh Minister Vijay Shah over his remarks concerning Colonel Sofiya Qureshi. The altered recommendation carried material consequences. In Chhattisgarh, Justice Sreedharan would have been the second senior-most judge, formed part of the High Court Collegium and stood in the immediate line of succession after Chief Justice Ramesh Sinha’s retirement. However, owing to the alteration, at Allahabad, he ranked seventh and remained outside the Collegium.
The Government may place relevant material before the SCC and seek reconsideration. Paragraph 25 of the MoP, however, makes the CJI’s opinion determinative and requires consultation concerning both the transferring and receiving High Courts. Paragraph 26 gives the Government the subsequent role of processing the recommendation for presidential approval. The decision to substitute Allahabad for Chhattisgarh was therefore ultimately the Collegium’s. Having disclosed that the Government sought reconsideration, the SCC ought also to have disclosed why it accepted the request and why Allahabad was selected, without which the second recommendation appears nothing less than a punishment posting.
Locating Responsibility for the Delay
The appointments notified on September 5 disclose delays at different stages of the process. By that date, Bombay, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab and Haryana, and Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh had each functioned under an Acting Chief Justice for 95 days; Calcutta for 76 days; Patna for 55 days; and Rajasthan for 342 days. The Collegium recommended the Chief Justices of Bombay, Calcutta, Patna, and Punjab and Haryana only on August 6. By then, these courts had already remained under acting leadership for 65, 46, 25 and 65 days, respectively. The Centre still took another 30 days to notify the appointments. Responsibility for the departure from the MoP therefore lies, at different stages, with both the Collegium and the Centre.
The Punjab and Haryana appointment may explain part of the executive delay. Reports indicate that the State Government’s views on the proposed appointment of Justice Ashwani Kumar Mishra were sought on August 12 but had not been received by September 1. Bihar, West Bengal and Maharashtra had immediately responded but the appointments concerning those States were also held back. The MoP does not require unrelated recommendations to be notified together. Therefore, the executive had held back other notifications in the guise of Punjab and Haryana.
Vacancies the Collegium Could Foresee
Madhya Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh require a slightly different assessment. Their vacancies, like those in Bombay and Punjab and Haryana, did not arise from scheduled retirements. They arose because the incumbent Chief Justices were elevated to the Supreme Court on June 2. This may explain why the appointments could not be completed one month before the vacancies arose. It does not make the vacancies entirely unforeseen. The recommendations for elevation to the Supreme Court had been made by the Collegium itself. It therefore knew that their acceptance would create vacancies in four High Courts.
Although the Collegium could not determine when the Centre would notify the elevations, it could have commenced the process of identifying successors or prepared contingent recommendations. Instead, regular successors for Madhya Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh were recommended only on August 31, nearly three months after the vacancies arose.
2. The Second Question: Silence and Speculation
The second, and perhaps more important, question concerns transparency. The SCC’s comfortable silence has, in the past, led to uncomfortable questions, leaving gaps to be filled by speculation and rumour. Justice B.V. Nagarathna’s dissent against the recommendation to elevate Justice Vipul M. Pancholi is one such example. The dissent was not published by the Collegium, despite Justice Nagarathna reportedly seeking its publication. Its existence and contents became known only through media reports. Information of obvious great significance thus entered the public domain through a leak rather than any formal disclosure by the Collegium.
A similar opacity attended the transfers of Justices Arun Monga and Tara Vitasta Ganju from the Delhi High Court in October 2025. Justice Monga was transferred again merely 34 days after being brought from Rajasthan to Delhi, without any explanation from the Collegium. News portals reported that adverse material concerning the conduct of the judges had influenced the decision. Members of the Delhi Bar disputed that account, and one senior advocate described Justice Monga as a victim of “rumour mongering in the corridors of the court”. In the absence of any official account, neither version could be properly tested. Speculation was left to supply the explanation withheld by the Collegium.
Piecemeal Disclosure by the Collegium
The difficulty is not confined to cases where official silence gives rise to speculation. At times, the Collegium itself releases information in fragments. Justice Krushna Ram Mohapatra’s case is one such instance. At its meeting held on August 6, the Collegium decided both to transfer him from the Orissa High Court to Chhattisgarh and to recommend his appointment as Chief Justice of that High Court. The statement issued thereafter disclosed only the transfer. His proposed appointment as Chief Justice was disclosed through a separate statement on August 31, even though that decision had also been taken on August 6. Thus, two intrinsically connected decisions concerning the same judge were taken together but disclosed more than three weeks apart. The point is not the eventual outcome of Justice Mohapatra’s appointment. It is that the Collegium withheld one part of its decision for reasons that remain unknown. The practice of piecemeal disclosure inevitably raises concern as to whether other decisions may also have been taken but remain uncommunicated or outside the public domain.
Even in the case of Justice Sreedharan, the SCC has allowed speculation to spill in by only partly disclosing the reason for alteration.
Advance Succession Is Possible
Justice Lisa Gill’s appointment as Chief Justice of the Andhra Pradesh High Court shows that advance succession planning is possible. The Collegium selected her on February 26 for a vacancy arising on April 25 and recommended her transfer approximately two months in advance. The Centre notified the transfer on March 6, enabling her to join the Andhra Pradesh High Court before the vacancy arose and avoiding an acting arrangement. Her appointment as Chief Justice was, however, notified only on April 22. The transition ensured continuity and came closer to the MoP, with the remaining delay attributable to the Centre.
The Only Consistency Is Inconsistency
Similar instances have happened in the past as well. Justice Karol had served as the Acting Chief Justice of the Himachal Pradesh High Court for over a year with the SCC delaying recommendation of Justice Surya Kant by 260 days and the centre delaying the appointment by 266 days. After elevation of Justice Satish Chandra Sharma to the Supreme Court, the acting charge of Delhi was given to Justice Manmohan for 325 days. Whereafter, he was appointed as Chief Justice of his parent High Court in complete departure of the MoP.
Appointments and transfers of judges carry great constitutional consequences under Articles 217 and 222. The MoP cannot be a discipline which the SCC enforces against the Centre but treats as optional in its own functioning. The SCC has, on several occasions, criticised the Centre for delaying recommendations or departing from the prescribed procedure. It must subject itself to the same standard.
Justice Sreedharan’s case raises the most uncomfortable question. The public record discloses that the Government sought reconsideration but says nothing about why the SCC accepted it. The change affected his seniority, membership of the High Court Collegium and prospective Chief Justiceship. If judicial primacy is the basis of the Collegium system, its exercise must be visible at least through broad reasons. Otherwise, it appears that the executive can seek transfer of judges to places of its choice.
The vacancies have been filled, but the uncomfortable questions concerning transparency and adherence to the MoP are still alive. The Collegium is judicially evolved, while the MoP is an arrangement between the Judiciary and the Executive to secure judicial independence. The Collegium’s legitimacy rests upon public confidence in the manner in which it exercises its authority. It must therefore act, and account for its actions, in sunlight. Until the SCC and the Centre both follow the MoP and explain departures from it, the only consistency in the process will remain its inconsistency.
