“I Have Dream For An All-India Inter-State Quiz For Judicial Officers”: Orissa High Court Chief Justice Muralidhar

Chief Justice of the Orissa High Court Dr. Justice S. Muralidhar has conveyed his wish to witness an ‘All-India Inter-State Quiz’ for all the Judicial Officers of the nation. He also expressed his desire to see quiz competitions for High Court Judges.

On Sunday, he was speaking at the Odisha Judicial Academy, Cuttack where the Orissa High Court organized the first ever State Level Quiz for the Judicial Officers of Odisha in collaboration with QShala. This initiative was taken as a part of the celebration of the 75^th year of the High Court’s establishment.

“I am hoping that this quiz definitely should now become an annual feature of the High Court. I would really like to see the day when there is a quiz for the High Court Judges… I would also like to see, this is a dream that I have for the future, that there is an All-India Quiz for Judicial Officers where we have Inter-State Quiz Competitions. It encourages them to keep in touch with History, Geography, also importantly the current events,” he said.

State Level Quiz For Judicial Officers

The quiz was conducted in three phases- 2 Preliminary Rounds, 6 Zonal Rounds and the Grand Finale. Two online Preliminary Rounds were organized on June 11, 2023 which was common to all the 30 districts where 432 Judicial Officers of various cadres participated individually.

The top 3 winners of each district formed the team to represent the respective district in the Zonal Rounds. For the Zonal Rounds 6 zones were formed with 1 Zonal Headquarter in each zone. Each zone was comprised of five districts.

The winning team of each zonal round participated in the Grand Finale held at the Odisha Judicial Academy, Cuttack on Sunday. Questions pertaining to the topics of Law, Politics & Social Studies from the lens of history, culture, music, movies, art and technology were asked.

The Koraput team, comprising of Mr. Swades Tripathy, Mr. Bikash Kiran Mishra and Mr. Animesh Jena won the Quiz competition. The teams from Gajapati and Sundargarh districts became the 1^st and 2^nd runners-up respectively.

Address by the Judges

In the welcome address, Justice Sangam Kumar Sahoo emphasized that the Judicial Officers are constantly required to enhance their knowledge in every field and the High Court has taken multiple initiatives such as provision for laptops with internet connectivity, law journals and books, creation of case law portal etc to enable them acquire knowledge.

He said the quiz was the brain-child of the Chief Justice to enhance the interest of Judicial Officers and urged the District Judges to form groups of Judicial Officers for discussion and sharing of information on regular basis.

Chief Justice Muralidhar said while celebrating 75^th year of the Orissa High Court, a number of events have been organized, but the quizzes for the law students and the Judicial Officers have been the most enjoyable. He expressed satisfaction over the participation of good number of woman judicial officers in the competition.