Vacancies In AFAT Being Filled Up Fast: Centre To SC

The Supreme Court today disposed of a petition which sought speedy filling up of vacancies in the Armed Forces Appellate Tribunal after noting that appointments are being made in the right earnest.

A bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra noted that appointments to Principal benches have been made and recently a judicial member and administrative member had been appointed.

The remaining appointments are being monitored by the Supreme Court.

Way back on November 15, 2016, then Chief Justice T S Thakur, while hearing the PIL had said “we hope and trust that the respondents shall make an endeavour to expedite the appointments especially when the working of the Tribunal is prejudicially affected on account of the vacancies remaining unfilled for a long time”

 This was after then Solicitor General Ranjit Kumar submitted that out of 17 Benches of the Armed Forces Appellate Tribunal, currently, five are functional and that regarding the remaining Benches the Government have received as many as 12 proposals including the proposal for the appointment 2 of Chairman of the Tribunal.

He had submitted that the proposal for appointment of seven judicial and administrative members was earlier received out of which three members have already been appointed while four other appointments based on the recommendations are still in the pipeline.

Kumar had further submitted that another recommendation had been received from the Selection Committee headed by Justice J.S. Khehar, a sitting Judge of the Court on 17.10.2016 recommending five names for appointment based on the meeting held on 17.10.2016.