The Hindu : SC ruling on powers of CJs

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Feb 11, 2003

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SC ruling on powers of CJs

By Our Legal Correspondent

NEW DELHI Feb. 10. The Supreme Court has held that the Chief Justice of a High Court has the requisite jurisdiction to set up a committee to deal with administrative work and it was not necessary that prior approval of the Full Court be obtained.

A three-Judge Bench, comprising the Chief Justice V.N. Khare, Justice S.B. Sinha and Justice A.R. Lakshmanan, observed that there could not be any doubt whatsoever that in the matter of control of the High Court in terms of Article 235 of the Constitution, the Chief Justice (of the High Court) had the jurisdiction to exercise the power.

Setting aside a judgment of the Rajasthan High Court which held that the Chief Justice was not authorised to appoint such a committee, the Bench noted that there had been a resolution authorising the Chief Justice to constitute a committee.

Once that resolution had been passed, there could not be any doubt that the exercise of the power was absolutely valid. "It is therefore, not correct to contend that the Chief Justice could appoint the two-judges committee only with the approval of the Full Court.''

The Chief Justice of a High Court though first among the judges, by the nature of office he held, he was the head of the State judiciary. Authorisation by the Full Court in favour of the Chief Justice to constitute a committee and/or to take actions for the subordinate judiciary must be viewed from that context.

Further, the question of consultation with the Judges would not arise unless the subject matter was identified. And it was for the Chief Justice to identify such matters and place them before the Full Court with relevant papers and documents, the Bench said. Once the Full Court approved the recommendations, it would become the decision of the court.

The Rajasthan High Court clearly erred in arriving at the finding that the constitution of the committee was illegal, the Bench held, and set aside the impugned judgment and allowed the appeals made by the High Court in this regard.

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