Judiciary Watch: 26 High Court posts vacated in September, total vacancies shoot up to 405

As many as 26 judicial posts from 12 different High Courts have been vacated this month. According to the Department of Justice, this takes the total number of vacancies in high courts to 405. Out of these, 13 Permanent Judges reached their retirement age, and the terms of 13 Additional Judges expired..Among the 13 Permanent Judges who retired this month is Former Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court, Justice Mohit Shah. Justice VK Tahilramani has been appointed Acting Chief Justice, making the Bombay High Court one of eight High Courts to have an ACJ at the helm..From the Madhya Pradesh High Court alone, three Permanent Judges retired this month..Given below is a list of Permanent Judges who retired this month:.High CourtName of judgeRetirement DateMadhya PradeshGS Solanki J.TK Kaushal J.BD Rathi J.September 5September 7September 15BombayMohit Shah CJ, AP Bhangale JSeptember 8September 18Punjab & HaryanaRP Nagrath J.KC Puri J.September 15September 19CalcuttaTapen Sen JSeptember 1DelhiKailash Gambhir JSeptember 6KeralaTR Ramachandran Nair JSeptember 4MadrasKBK Vasuki JSeptember 8Patna Dharnidhar Jha JSeptember 6RajasthanNisha Gupta JSeptember 12.To offset the vacancies, the President of India has wasted little time in appointing 13 new Additional Judges in 5 different high courts, for a period of three months. Under Article 224 of the Constitution, the President is empowered with appointing duly qualified persons as additional Judges for a period not exceeding two years..With judicial appointments put on hold pending the Supreme Court’s NJAC verdict, nothing can be done to reduce the number of vacancies in the high courts, save the exercise of Article 224. Even after the new appointments, the total number of vacancies has increased to 405, from 392 as of September 1..In fact, the number of vacancies is only going to increase in the next couple of months. As many as 38 posts will be vacated by the end of November. Out of these, 7 are Permanent Judges and 31 are Additional Judges..Here is a list of the Permanent Judges who will be retiring in the coming weeks..Name of JudgeHigh CourtRetirement DateSreedhar Rao CJGauhatiOctober 20SP Wangdi JSikkimOctober 24Roshan Dalvi JBombayNovember 5MS Chauhan JPunjab & HaryanaNovember 11Navita Singh JPunjab & HaryanaNovember 11VN SinhaPatnaNovember 14MK JhaPatnaNovember 30