Attorney General wants retirement age of SC, HC judges increased
New Delhi, July 6: Attorney General K.K. Venugopal, the government's primary lawyer in the Supreme Court, on Friday said the government should consider raising the retirement age of Supreme Court judges to 68 and High Court judges to 65. It is currently 65 and 62.
Venugopal, speaking at the farewell function organised by the Supreme Court Bar Association for Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel, referred to various cases he was hearing and the vision he had.
Many of the "innovative thoughts and ideas" of Justice Goel would remain "unfulfilled because of his retirement from office", he said.
"We are losing a judge of great excellence. His concern for the common man was great. This could have been avoided if the age of retirement was not 62 for a high court judge and 65 for Supreme Court judges.
"That is because a judge has to evolve over the years. He has to have vast experience as an advocate. When he becomes a judge, he has to sit on different benches doing different subjects so that he is an expert in each one.
"Finally, the judge is elevated to the Supreme Court. And in the Supreme Court, it is only when he presides that he is able to hold a sway in regard to the innovative thoughts that he has.
"By then, it is time to say 'goodbye'. Therefore, it is my sincere hope that the Government of India will look into this issue and raise it to, say, 65 for judges of high courts and 68 for judges of the Supreme Court. That will be in the interest of the justice delivery system."
With Justice Goel's retirement, the top court is left with 22 judges as against the sanctioned strength of 31.
Justice Goel enrolled at the Bar in 1974. He practised before the Punjab & Haryana High Court for five years and the Supreme Court and Delhi High Court for about 22 years.
Justice Goel headed the bench which delivered the judgment forbidding immediate arrest under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
Justice Goel, who had a four-year tenure in the apex court, said it was the thought about people falsely accused not having a forum to turn to that persuaded him to take up this profession.
Justice Goel would be remembered for taking the path-breaking step of referring the issue of divorce through instant triple talaq among Muslims to a five-judge constitution bench which held it as illegal and arbitrary.
He was also part of another landmark judgement of 2016 quashing the National Judicial Appointments Commission Act which sought to give the executive a say in the appointment of top judges.
Justice Goel shared his dream for the legal system, saying he wants to see India at number 1 in the rule of law index.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Confident we are going to win Kerala: Shashi Tharoor
New Delhi (PTI): Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Thursday expressed confidence in the victory of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in Kerala, saying the Congress-led alliance will win more than 75 seats out of the total 140 in the state.
Tharoor, who hails from Kerala, said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls, most of which predicted a victory for the UDF that has been out of power for 10 years in the state.
"We have been on the ground. I have campaigned in 59 constituencies across 12 districts out of 14. I was very confident we are going to win.
"Everything that I have picked up from not just my party colleagues and workers but also from other observers, media and others have always convinced me that we were going to score a comfortable win of above 75 seats. And all the (exit) polls have confirmed the same thing," he told reporters here.
The Thiruvananthapuram MP said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls but in general he was not a big fan of exit polls in India.
"Because ours is not purely a homogenous society. We have to take into account gender issue, caste issue, class issue, regional disparities. You never get a convincingly large enough sample to give an accurate poll and now there is the additional complication that we have heard about in West Bengal this year that many people are unwilling to answer the questions of the pollsters," he said.
The Congress leader said normally, it used to be below 10 per cent that people said that they would not answer.
"Even if you are a reputable exit pollster, in Bengal, one polling company has said 60 per cent of people refused to answer. So, what is the worth of a poll where 60 per cent of your respondents have not answered," he said.
Several exit polls on Wednesday predicted a comeback by the Congress-led UDF in Kerala after 10 years, dethroning the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF).
Polling for the 140-member Kerala assembly was held on April 9. Results of assembly elections in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Puducherry, besides Kerala, will be announced on May 4.
