Delhi High Court reserves order on PIL against Supreme Court collegium recommendations

NEW DELHI: Delhi High Court today reserved its verdict on a plea challenging its single judge bench order rejecting a petition to restrain the Supreme Court collegium from recommending appointments to the higher judiciary.

"You (petitioner) file your written submissions. We will consider it and pass an order," a bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal said.

Delhi-based lawyer R P Luthra, who has filed the plea, told the bench he was not arguing for removing the judges who were recently elevated to the apex court.

"I am not for removing judges. This is not my grievance. I have come here for protection of my fundamental rights which are given to me under the Constitution. Fundamental rights of the citizens have to be protected. I am against the system which is in function," he told the bench.

He alleged that the collegium system for recommending appointments to the higher judiciary was "unconstitutional".

During the hearing, when the petitioner argued that his fundamental right was violated, the bench asked, "Tell us how your fundamental rights have been violated."

Responding to this, he said that recommendation of the collegium was not transparent as only some of the lawyers were considered for elevation.

Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Sanjay Jain said that all the lawyers cannot be considered to be appointed as judges in the higher judiciary.

"The comparative study which he (petitioner) is making is beyond the purview of judicial review," the ASG said.

Earlier, a single judge of the high court had in May this year had dismissed two separate pleas, out of which one was filed by Luthra, which had also sought to put a restraint on the government from acting on the collegium's recommendation for elevating three high court chief justices and a senior lawyer to the apex court.

The four new judges, whose names were recommended by the Supreme Court collegium and was approved by President Pranab Mukherjee, were administered the oath of office by Chief Justice of India T S Thakur in May this year.

The four justices sworn in were -- A M Khanwilkar, D Y Chandrachud, Ashok Bhushan and L Nageshwar Rao.