SC recommends five lawyers as Karnataka HC judges

BENGALURU/ NEW DELHI: After three years, five lawyers have been recommended for elevation as judges of the Karnataka high court.
The Supreme Court collegium comprising CJI Dipak Misra and judges — Justices J Chelameswar and Ranjan Gogoi — considered the names of 25 advocates and cleared 19 for the Karnataka, Madras and Calcutta high courts. Nine lawyers were recommended for the Madras HC and five for Calcutta HC.
The five lawyers recommended on December 4 for the Karnataka HC are Krishna S Dixit who is currently serving as assistant solicitor general, representing the Centre at the high court; R Devdas who is serving as principal government advocate of the state government; BM Shyam Prasad, a designated senior advocate; SG Pandit, who is well-versed in service and education matters; and Sunil Dutt Yadav, special counsel for the government in NICE project-related matters.

The collegium rejected the views of the Karnataka governor and chief minister expressing reservations on some of the names proposed by the high court. The governor had conveyed that some of the candidates did not meet the requirement of efficiency in performance.
SC sends back 4 of 10 names from Karnataka HC
The collegium said “it need not be emphasised that assessment of performance of the persons recommended is done objectively by the judiciary at the HC and SC level”. The collegium also noted that the CM had conveyed his disagreement on some names and forwarded communications from bodies of advocates expressing concern that the names recommended did not provide opportunity of representation to a cross-section of society.
The last appointment to the Karnataka HC was on January 2,2015 when five members of the bar were elevated as additional judges of the HC.
The SC collegium, which considered a total of 10 names sent by the Karnataka high court, has remitted back the names of GS Kannur, KN Phanindra, K Aravind Kamath and Naga Prasanna to the chief justice of Karnataka HC to be considered afresh by the HC collegium. One of the recommendations, K Chaitnya, was not found suitable for elevation.
The collegium also cleared the names of 25 additional judges for appointment as permanent judge in five HCs. Justice G Narendar, presently serving as an additional judge, has been recommended for appointment as a permanent judge of the Karnataka HC.
The collegium recommended C Emalias, PT Asha, M Nirmal Kumar, Subramonium Prasad, Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy, N Anand Venkatesh, GK Ilanthiraiyan, Krishnan Ramasamy and C Saravanan for the Madras HC.