Supreme Court Collegium also recommends elevation of Uttarakhand Chief Justice KM Joseph as judge of the apex court

In a first, the Supreme Court Collegium has decided to elevate a woman lawyer – Indu Malhotra – straight from the Bar Council to be made a judge of the apex court.

The Collegium, comprising senior-most judges of the Supreme Court – Chief Justice Dipak Misra, Justices Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan B Lokur and Kurian Joseph – has, according to media reports, recommended unanimously the appointment of Malhotra and Uttarakhand Chief Justice KM Joseph as judges of the apex court.

It is pertinent to note that in the first 39 years of its existence, the Supreme Court’s judiciary had no woman member. The glass ceiling was broken in 1989 with the appointment of Justice Fathima Beevi as a judge of the Supreme Court. Justice Beevi was not just the first woman judge of the Supreme Court but also the first Muslim woman to have made it to India’s higher judiciary. The other women judges of the Supreme Court have been Justice Sujatha Manohar,  Justice Ruma Pal, Justice Gyan Sudha Misra and Justice Ranjana Desai.

With Malhotra’s appointment, the Supreme Court will now have two sitting women judges, the other being Justice R Banumati. Malhotra would be one of only seven women judges that the apex court has had so far since independence.

However, this won’t be the first time that the apex court will have two sitting women judges. Speaking to India Legal, Justice (retired) Gyan Sudha Misra said: “Little after Justice Ruma Pal retired I was elevated to the Supreme Court and was the only lady judge for a while before Justice Ranjana Desai was elevated to the SC. Justice Desai and I served as judges of the Supreme Court together for a while.”

However, when asked for her views on the direct elevation of a lawyer to the SC judgeship, Justice (retd) Misra said: “It is the Collegium’s decision and I would not like to comment on it”.

Malhotra had, in 2007, become the second woman to be designated as a Senior Advocate by the Supreme Court. A expert on arbitration, Malhotra has authored the third edition of The Law and Practice of Arbitration and Conciliation, 2014 and has appeared in various domestic and international commercial arbitrations. She has also served as a member of the Centre-appointed High Level Committee (HLC) in the Ministry of Law and Justice to review ‘Institutionalization of Arbitration Mechanism in India’.

Daughter of the late Om Prakash Malhotra, a legal luminary himself with pioneering work in the legal disciplines of industrial disputes and arbitration, Indu Malhotra had enrolled as a lawyer in the Bar Council of Delhi in 1983. Then, in 1988 she qualified as an Advocate-on-Record (AoR) in the Supreme Court and also served as Standing Counsel for the State of Haryana and represented statutory bodies like the Securities Exchange Board of India (Sebi), Delhi Development Authority (DDA), Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR), before the Supreme Court.

The Collegium’s other pick for the Supreme Court judiciary – Uttarakhand Chief Justice KM Joseph – is also an interesting one. It was Justice Joseph who had, in 2016, struck down the imposition of President’s Rule in Uttarakhand by the Narendra Modi-led government and allowed Congress’ Harish Rawat to prove his strength in the state assembly. The decision had paved the way for Harish Rawat to return as Uttarakhand chief minister following the controversial defections to the BJP that had been orchestrated by his predecessor and then party colleague Vijay Bahuguna. A month after he delivered this verdict, the Supreme Court Collegium had recommended Justice Joseph’s transfer to the joint high court for Andhra Pradesh and Telangana in Hyderabad. However, the Modi government refused to clear the transfer, instead choosing to keep the Chief Justice’s post vacant. The high court at Hyderabad still does not have a full-time Chief Justice.

The Collegium has also regularised Chief Justices of five High Courts which currently had acting chief justices. Justice J Bhattacharaya, who is presently chief justice of Calcutta High Court, will be the new chief justice of Delhi High Court, taking over from Justice Gita Mittal who has been serving as the acting chief justice of the court for several months now.

Chief Justice of the Chattishgarh High Court, Justice TB Radhakrishnan, has been transferred to the Andhra Pradesh High Court which Justice Abhilasha Kumari of the Gujarat High Court has been transferred to Manipur as chief justice. The Collegium has also appointed Justice A Dominic as chief justice of the Kerala High Court while Justice Ajay Rastogi has been transferred to the Tripura High Court. Justice Surya Kant of the Punjab and Haryana High court will be the new chief justice of Himachal Pradesh.