Nod for Justice Kausik Chanda as Calcutta HC permanent judge

In June this year, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had told the High Court that the state government had objected to the proposal to appoint Justice Chanda as a permanent judge.

Justice Chanda was caught in the eye of a political storm in West Bengal when Banerjee sought that the case seeking re-evaluation of the Nandigram election results be reassigned from his bench, citing a “likelihood of bias”.

During the hearing for recusal of the judge, Banerjee had stated that the judge could be biased as the government had opposed the proposal to appoint him as permanent judge since he was an “active member” of the BJP.

In a letter to Chief Justice (Acting) Rajesh Bindal, Banerjee’s counsel Sanjay Basu had said that the Chief Minister had earlier “conveyed her objections and reservations” about Justice Chanda’s confirmation as permanent judge, and so there was “reasonable apprehension… of bias”. Eventually, Justice Chanda recused from hearing the case.

Justice Chanda was Additional Solicitor General of India in the High Court in 2015 before his appointment as judge. He has a tenure till 2036 as a judge of the High Court.

On Wednesday, the Collegium for appointments to High Courts, which comprises Justices U U Lalit and A M Khanwilkar apart from the CJI, also notified that it has approved proposals to appoint six additional judges of the Karnataka High Court as permanent judges of that court. The six judges are Justices Sanjay Gowda, Jyoti Mulimani, Nataraj Rangaswamy, Hemant Chandangoudar, Pradeep Singh Yerur and Maheshan Nagaprasanna.

For the Telangana High Court, the Collegium recommended appointment of six district judicial officers and a member of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal as judges. Those recommended are judges Sree Sudha, C Sumalatha, G Radha Rani, M Laxman, N Tukaramji, A Venkateshwara Reddy and ITAT member P Madhavi Devi.