Recent SC Suggestion: NEET Like Exam for Lower Judiciary

How the judges of lower judiciary are selected currently across India? What is recent stance of Supreme Court on All-India common test for lower judiciary? Is it good or a bad idea?

Current Procedure

Appointments to the state judicial services below the rank of district judge are made by the governor in consultation with the State Public Service Commission and the high court. The selection examination is conducted by State Public Service Commissions (PCS) as well as High Courts and  is generally two phased (written and interview) or three passed (prelims, mains, interview).

• Through PCSs, a judge is appointed at lower judiciary i.e. Munsif Court and through the exam conducted by High Court an Additional District Judge (ADJ) is appointed.
• States have their own mechanism of conducting these exams and appointing of judges.

The Supreme Court Suggestion

Supreme Court has favoured the idea of All India Common test for lower judiciary on the lines of NEET. This suggestion is supported by Chief Justice JS Khehar; who said that this would ensure quick appointments necessary for effective judicial machinery in the country.

Discussion

The basic issue is that most states are not able to conduct examinations on time and due to this there is lack of significant number of judges at lower judiciary (around 4900 vacancies) which resulted in lot of pending cases. The centre had also suggested a centralized examination can be conducted by a recruitment body under supervision of SC or to handover this job to UPSC or adopt an IBPS kind of model.

We note that neither all the states, nor all the high courts would be in favour of such disruptions. Both would feel that it is against federal structure etc. Further, High Courts in India are independent of administrative control of the SC; so they might take it as something impinging on their freedom.

However, these apprehensions seem to be overhyped rather. SC has cleared that All-India common test will only create a mechanism for conducting exam and it will not interfere in the appointment process and reservation policy of different states. The further question would be on – how the procedure followed in each state would be preserved while migrating to such an examination? SC has said that the a merit list will be prepared on the basis of national test  and then each state would be allowed to appoint judges as per their rules and reservation policies.