30 Judges Appointed to Madras, Calcutta, Karnataka and MP High Courts

The Centre has notified the appointment of 30 advocates and judicial officers as Judges and Additional Judges across the Madras, Calcutta, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh High Courts, in a move that assumes significance against the backdrop of India's massive judicial pendency.

The appointments, made by the President in consultation with the Chief Justice of India, comprise 15 appointments to the Madras High Court, eight to the Calcutta High Court, six to the Karnataka High Court and one to the Madhya Pradesh High Court. The move comes as District and Subordinate Courts face a mounting workload, with the National Judicial Data Grid showing 5,03,79,538 pending cases.

Official Department of Justice data showed 4,99,56,834 cases pending as of March 13, 2026, including 1,48,06,291 cases pending for more than five years. Uttar Pradesh accounted for the largest share with 1,21,37,452 cases, followed by Maharashtra with 60,60,201, West Bengal with 39,08,587 and Bihar with 37,19,519. Tamil Nadu had 17,63,798 pending cases, while Karnataka had 24,36,610 and Madhya Pradesh 21,22,639.

The Madras High Court has received 15 appointees, including Govindarajan Krishnaswamy, Rajnish Pathiyil, Ramesh Natarajan, G.K. Muthukumaar, Ramakrishnan Rajesh Vivekananthan, Raveekumar Sankaranarayanan, Dilip Kumar Nagarajan, Ellappan Manoharan and judicial officers including Dr. P. Murugan, M.D. Sumathi, S. Alli and C. Thirumagal. S. Alli brings significant judicial-administrative experience, having served as Registrar General of the Madras High Court, while G.K. Muthukumaar has an intellectual-property and corporate-law background, including experience with Anand and Anand.

The Calcutta High Court gets eight Additional Judges, including Aryak Dutt, Atarup Banerjee, Sandip Kumar De, Partha Pratim Roy, Sudip Deb, Anuj Singh, Arjun Ray Mukherjee and Rishad Medora. Their publicly recorded work covers civil, writ, criminal, commercial, arbitration and municipal litigation. Sudip Deb, for instance, has appeared in commercial and admiralty proceedings, while Medora has handled commercial and arbitration-related disputes.

Karnataka receives six Additional Judges, while Amit Lahoti becomes the sole appointee to the Madhya Pradesh High Court. Lahoti has handled constitutional, revenue and land-related litigation.

The appointments come amid significant vacancies. In May, the Madras High Court had 52 working judges against 75 sanctioned posts, while Calcutta had 42 against 72. Under Article 217, permanent High Court judges retire at 62, while Additional Judges under Article 224 can initially serve for up to two years. With the judicial backlog continuing to grow, the appointments are expected to strengthen High Court capacity and improve the country's ability to address prolonged pendency.