New chief justices for Gujarat, Kerala, Orissa and Telangana high courts; Bombay, Manipur and Andhra Pradesh wait

Four recommendations of the Supreme Court Collegium for chief justices of various high courts have been accepted, three recommendations are still pending with the Union government.

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ON Wednesday, the Union government notified the appointments of the chief justices to the high courts of Kerala, Gujarat, Telangana and Orissa while holding back the appointment of chief justices of the high courts of Bombay, Manipur and Andhra Pradesh.

Gujarat High Court's Justice Ashish J. Desai has been appointed as Chief Justice of the Kerala High Court while Allahabad High Court's judge Justice Sunita Agarwal has been sent to the Gujarat High Court as Chief Justice.

The government also notified the appointment of the Karnataka High Court's judge Alok Aradhe as Chief Justice of the Telangana High Court. He originally hails from the Madhya Pradesh High Court.

Orissa High Court's Justice Subhasis Talapatra has been appointed as Chief Justice thereupon with effect from the retirement of the incumbent Chief Justice Dr Justice S. Muralidhar on August 7.

Even though the Union government has cleared the appointments of the chief justices to the four high courts, it withheld the recommendation of the collegium to appoint the Bombay High Court's Justice Dhiraj Singh Thakur as Chief Justice of the Andhra Pradesh High Court.

The government is also yet to notify the appointment of Delhi High Court's judge Siddharth Mridul as Chief Justice of the Manipur High Court.

The government is yet to clear the appointment of the Allahabad High Court's Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya as Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court.

All these names for appointment as chief justices, including the ones not cleared by the government, were recommended by the Supreme Court Collegium on July 5.

The case of Justice Thakur is peculiar. Earlier, his name was recommended for appointment as Chief Justice of the Manipur High Court by the collegium on February 9. 

But the government did not act on the recommendation. On July 5, the collegium altered its earlier recommendation to appoint Justice Thakur as Chief Justice of the Manipur High Court and substituted it by a recommendation to appoint him as Chief Justice of the Andhra Pradesh High Court.