Formed on Supreme Court intervention, panel to frame uniform post-retirement benefits for retired HC judges by November

An office memorandum issued by the Department of Justice under the Union Law Ministry on August 31 named former IAS officer S K G Rahate, currently chairperson of the Airports Economic Regulatory Authority of India (AERA), as chairman of the panel. Annie George Mathew, a retired Indian Audit and Accounts Service officer, and Rakesh Kumar Singh, a retired Indian Defence Accounts Service officer, are its members. G Muthuraja, Joint Secretary in the Department of Justice, will serve as its secretary, with the department providing secretarial support.

The committee has been asked to submit its report within three months.

Under its terms of reference, the panel will study the benefits state governments give to retired Chief Justices and High Court judges, and examine representations made by the Association of Retired Judges of the Supreme Court and High Courts of India on July 1, 2022, and March 18, 2025. It will also consult stakeholders, including the Chief Secretaries of all states and Union Territories.

In its July 20 order, a three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant and comprising Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana noted that it was “a matter of record” that basic facilities — domestic help, drivers, telephones, medical reimbursement and transit stay in government guest houses and circuit houses — “vary from state to state”. This lack of uniformity, it said, had first led the All-India Judges’ Association to approach the authorities and then the court.

“There can indeed be no doubt that these facilities must be ensured on a uniform basis, and there is no reason whatsoever for such amenities being at variance from state to state,” the bench said. The order had asked Solicitor General Tushar Mehta to persuade the Centre to set up the committee within two weeks, and requested that the panel’s recommendations be submitted to the government and placed before the court within three months of its constitution.

The committee was set up about six weeks after the order. The matter is next listed on November 3, before the committee’s three-month deadline runs out at the end of November.

A decade of directions

A contempt petition was filed in 2015 by Justice V S Dave as president of the association, ina writ petition dating back to 2002. Over the years, the Supreme Court has issued a string of directions on the issue which states have implemented, albeit unevenly.

Those directions required that retired High Court judges be given facilities on par with sitting judges; that they be reimbursed for treatment in private hospitals without prior approval of the state government, including treatment taken in another state; that a cashless facility be made available; and that the Registrar General of the High Court be the sanctioning authority. On domestic help, drivers, telephones and other benefits, states were told to match what Andhra Pradesh provides, “improved from time to time”.

The model legislation, Andhra Pradesh notified its Retired Chief Justices and Judges Domestic Help(s) and other Benefits Rules in 2021 has been referenced by the Court as a template for other states to follow. The court has clarified that these directions are only the minimum. States “benevolent enough” to offer more are welcome to do so, it said, and those already giving better facilities must not bring them down. For example, an Uttarakhand rule capped reimbursement for retired judges at Rs 5 lakh on High Court approval, with state government approval needed beyond that. It directed the state’s Chief Secretary to appear in person and explain whether a similar ceiling applied to sitting judges, and if not, why one was necessary for retired judges.

In February 2025, the court directed all states to report compliance with its earlier orders. Hearing contempt petitions on medical reimbursement, cashless treatment, domestic help and telephone allowance around the same time, the court. It also appointed senior advocate Pravin H Parekh as amicus curiae.

The Supreme Court benchmark

The debate over medical costs specifically was heard from 2018, when a bench headed by Justice Ranjan Gogoi took the “tentative view” that retired Chief Justices and judges of High Courts should be reimbursed for all medical expenses, including hospital charges, incurred on treatment for themselves and their dependent family members.

The court pointed to its own practice as a model. Sitting and retired Supreme Court judges, it noted, are fully reimbursed for all medical expenses except inadmissible items, including treatment in private hospitals. The sanctioning authority is the Chief Justice of India, who has delegated the power to other sitting judges. States wishing to examine that policy, the court said, could find it on the Supreme Court’s website.