SC Collegium recommends names of six judges for appointment as HC chief justices

Justice Sen, whose parent HC is the Calcutta High Court, is one of the senior-most judges in the All-India Seniority of High Court judges.

As per the Collegium’s decision, Justice Sen will be replaced in the Meghalaya High Court as Chief Justice by Bombay High Court judge Revati Mohite Dere. Justice Mohite Dere is currently the senior-most puisne judge at the Bombay High Court. Born on April 17, 1965, in Pune, she completed her LLB from Symbiosis Law College and later obtained an LLM from the University of Cambridge.

She began her practice with her father, Senior Advocate Vijayrao A Mohite. She practised on the criminal, civil and constitutional side in the Bombay High Court and also worked as Government Pleader and Public Prosecutor for the Maharashtra government, before being elevated as an Additional Judge of the HC on June 21, 2013. She was made a permanent judge on March 2, 2016.

Justice Mohite Dere authored several judgments on custodial deaths, women’s entry into the inner sanctum of Mumbai’s Haji Ali Dargah, and passed directions against the police for unlawful detentions and encounter cases. If appointed, she will be one of the two women Chief Justices of a High Court. Justice Sunita Agarwal, Chief Justice of the Gujarat HC, is currently the only other woman to serve as a Chief Justice.

The Collegium also recommended Justice Manoj Kumar Gupta, judge of the Allahabad High Court, for elevation as Chief Justice of the Uttarakhand HC. Justice G Narendar, the incumbent Chief Justice of the Uttarakhand HC, is also due to retire on January 9.

The Collegium also recommended Justice M S Sonak, judge of the Bombay High Court, to be appointed Chief Justice of the Jharkhand HC. Justice Sonak’s elevation is necessitated by the retirement of the current Chief Justice, Tarlok Singh, on January 8, 2026.

Justice Sonak, the second senior-most puisne judge at the Bombay HC was born on November 28, 1964, and after completing his school education and LLB from MS College of Law at Panaji in Goa, he enrolled as an advocate in 1988 and practiced at Panaji (Goa) bench of the HC and dealt with civil, constitutional, labour, service, environmental along with tax-related matters.

He also worked as Special Counsel of the state government and statutory corporations before he was elevated as an Additional Judge on June 21, 2013. Working as a senior-most administrative judge at the HC bench in Goa, he drew attention for publicly registering a living will and pledging his organs to create awareness on end-of-life planning.

Among several decisions, Justice Sonak had initiated a suo motu case based on an incident of alleged assault on a lawyer by constables of Porvorim police station. He also upheld the constitutional validity of Goa’s Green Cess Act, which enables the state government to collect cess on the utilisation of pollution-causing hazardous products and uses it to reduce the effects of carbon footprint in the state.

The Collegium also recommended the appointment of Justice A Muhamed Mustaque from Kerala as Chief Justice of the High Court in Sikkim, and Justice Sangam Kumar Sahoo, judge of the Orissa High Court, for appointment as Chief Justice of the Patna High Court.