"Merely Adding More Judges Is Not The Answer" : Supreme Court Refuses To Entertain PIL To Double The Number Of Judges

The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to entertain a petition filed by BJP leader and Advocate Ashwini Upadhyay seeking to double the number of judges in High Courts and trial courts. The matter was heard by a bench comprising Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice PS Narasimha. 

At the very outset, CJI Chandrachud expressed that "populist measures" and "simplistic solutions" were unlikely to solve any issues. He orally remarked–

"These are all populist measure. It's difficult to fill the 160 seats in Allahabad High Court and you're asking for 320? Have you been to Bombay High Court? Not even a single judge can be added there because there is no infrastructure. Adding more judges is not the answer. Then why 320 in Allahabad, add 640? Every evil you see doesn't require a PIL. Try getting judges to fill out the existing seats, then you'll see how difficult it is."

He further added that getting more judges was not the "panacea of all evils" and such general PILs could not be entertained by the Supreme Court. CJI Chandrachud also remarked that the court may impose costs on such PILs for taking up the judicial time which was public time to hear genuine matters. 

However, Advocate Upadhyay submitted that the plea was in the form of a PIL and was not adversarial. He stated that crores of Indians were suffering due to the lack of judicial redress caused due to courts being overburdened.

The bench remained unconvinced. CJI Chandrachud stated that the petition was just like the Parliament saying that an act could be passed to ensure that all matters will be disposed off within 6 months. Justice PS Narasimha added that there had been multiple studies stating that merely increasing number of judges would not be solution for pendency of cases.

When Advocate Upadhyay continued arguing and stated that the situation was different in all developed countries, where the number of judges was more, CJI Chandrachud stated–

"This kind of petition would not be entertained by either the UK and the US Supreme Court. The US Supreme Court doesn't even hear lawyers on whether cases should be admitted. This is because of our system. Come back with proper research. There are problems, but these simplistic things won't be the solutions. When I was in Allahabad High Court, the then Law Minister had asked me to increase the judges to 25 percent. I was like good lord, I cannot even fill the 160. Ask the Bombay High Court how many lawyers are willing to accept judgeship. Merely adding more judges is not the answer, you need good judges. Please withdraw it."

Accordingly, the petition was dismissed as withdrawn and liberty was granted to file a fresh plea with research on statistics on recruitment, vacancies etc.

CASE TITLE: Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay v. UoI And Ors. WP(C) No. 14/2021

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