A petition has been filed in the Supreme Court seeking direction to the Central government to take measures to make the retirement age of the judges of the High Courts and Supreme Court uniform.
The petition has been filed by Advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay stating that it is irrational to have different retirement ages for judges of constitutional courts.
The petition further sought direction stating,
“The Court may use its plenary constitutional power to declare that the Judges of High Courts shall retire at the age of 65 years until Centre takes steps to reduce the pendency of cases from 15 to 3 years in spirt of the Resolution dated November 25, 2009.”
Earlier, Ashwini also wrote a letter to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking an increase in the retirement age of the Judges of Higher Courts and Subordinate Courts. The letter stated that the problem of delay in disposal of cases is not a new problem in India and has been troubling us for a long time. However, it is no longer a tiny problem now feeding on the money of the common man. It has put the judicial system under strain and has shaken the confidence of the people also.
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The plea submits,
“It is necessary to state that the Bill, to increase the retirement age of judges of High Courts, was introduced in 2010 but lapsed in 2014 due to dissolution of Loksabha. It is also necessary to state that on 22.6.2019, the then CJI Justice Sh. Ranjan Gogoi also wrote a letter to increase the retirement age of High Court judges to 65 years.”
Ashwini has further submitted that the injury to the citizens is huge as due to early retirement, the finest advocates are not willing to become judges, that violates the rule of law guaranteed under Article 14 and right to speedy justice guaranteed under Article 21.