Naveen Patnaik on Wednesday urged Union law and Justice Minister Kapil Sibal to increase the strength of judges of the Odisha High Court to 27, including the number of permanent Judges.
CM Patnaik in a letter to Sibal, justified the demand for hiking the number of judges from 22 to 27 considering cumulative pendency of cases and available infra and assured of financial and related provision so as to ensure proper functioning of all the judges.
Patnaik cited the proposal of former Odisha Chief Justice S Barman Roy of October 24, 2003 that the strength of permanent judges should be increased to 17 and that of additional judges to 10, taking the total number of the judges to 27.
Stating that the pendency of cases, compared to 2003, has substantially increased, the Chief Minister said, “The State Government is, therefore, of the view that it is time the approved strength was increased to 27 in line with the earlier proposal of Justice Barman Roy.”
Pointing out that the present acting Chief Justice of the High Court has also agreed to the proposal, Patnaik assured the Union law Minister that the State Government would provide the required financial and staff support to sustain functioning of additional judges. He also pointed out that a new building of the High Court has been constructed in the meanwhile.