The Union government notified the appointment of five new judges to the Supreme Court. With their appointments, the number of judges in the Supreme Court will rise to 32. Currently, the Supreme Court of India has a sanctioned strength of thirty-four Judges and is presently functioning with twenty-seven Judges.

Now there remain only two vacancies at the Supreme Court, which could be filled in the coming days if SC Collegium’s January 31 proposal to elevate Allahabad High Court Chief Justice Rajesh Bindal and Gujarat High Court Chief Justice Aravind Kumar as SC judges, is accepted by the president.

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The 5 newly-appointed judges are:

• Justice Pankaj Mithal, the chief justice of Rajasthan High Court
• Justice Sanjay Karol, the chief justice of Patna High Court
• Justice PV Sanjay Kumar, the chief justice of Manipur High Court
• Justice Ahsanuddin Amanullah, a judge of Patna High Court
• Justice Manoj Misra, a judge of Allahabad High Court

Timeline of These Appointment:

• The Supreme Court collegium had recommended the names of these judge for elevation on December 13.
• The notification came a day after the Supreme Court had pulled up the Union government for delaying the appointments. The court had given the Centre 10 days to process the appointments, after , after Attorney General N Venkataramani had said that it would be done soon.
• In the past few months, the Collegium has been releasing more information in public about its rationale for recommending judges, names pending with the government and inputs of intelligence agencies on judicial appointments.
• On January 24, Union law minister Kiren Rijiju said that the releasing of certain portions of sensitive reports of the Intelligence Bureau and the Research and Analysis Wing was a “matter of grave concern”.
• Traditionally, discussions that took place during collegium meetings were not recorded or released in any form, and only the names of the recommended candidates were released in the public domain.

Attorney General of India: R Venkataramani