The Union cabinet today cleared the decks for renaming of the Madras and Bombay high courts. A bill in this regard will be placed in Parliament. The law ministry had sought the approval of the cabinet to introduce The High Courts (Alteration of Names) Bill, 2016 in the August House.
Once cleared, the Madras High Court will be called Chennai High Court while the Bombay High Court will be known as Mumbai High Court through an act of parliament.
Both the high courts were established under the Indian High Court Act of 1861 and the concurrence of the concerned high court is needed in addition to assent from the state government.
As of now, there is no central law to deal with the change in names of high courts. The clamour for changing the names of the Bombay and Madras high courts has been on ever since these cities got rechristened as Mumbai and Chennai, respectively.
Other high courts may now follow suit. Odisha has been demanding that the Orissa High Court be renamed Odisha High and Calcutta High court could be renamed Kolkata High Court.