Supreme Court: Supreme Court Collegium headed by Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud C.J., Sanjay Kishan Kaul and K.M. Joseph J.J., passed a resolution dated 12-04-2023, recommending elevation from the Delhi Higher Judiciary namely:
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Judicial Officer Girish Kathpalia
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Judicial Officer Dharmesh Sharma
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Judicial Officer Manoj Jain
as the Judges of the Delhi High Court.
The Chief Justice of Delhi High Court in consultation with his two senior most colleagues recommended their elevation dated 22-12-2022 whose filed was received in the Supreme Court from the Department of Justice dated 07-04-2023.
The Collegium, for the purpose of assessing the merit and suitability for elevating the Judicial Officers, scrutinized the material placed on record including the observations made by the Department of Justice and complaints received against them.
The Judgement Evaluation committee graded the judgments authored by all three Judicial Officers as ‘outstanding’. The Intelligence Bureau reported that they had a good personal and professional image and nothing adverse had come to notice against their integrity. Thus, the Collegium opined that they were fit and suitable candidates for appointment as Delhi High Court Judges.
The Collegium clarified that their inter se seniority was to be fixed as per the existing practice.
While considering the above proposal, the Collegium took note of the fact that the above proposal involved non-recommendation of a senior Judicial Officer wherein the Minutes of the High Court Collegium had duly recorded reasons for not recommending the name of the said Judicial Officer which they were in agreement with.
