Rejanish KV vs K Deepa 2025 INSC 1208 - Art. 233 Constitution - District Judge Recruitment - Judicial Officers

Constitution of India - Article 233- Judicial Officers who have already completed seven years in Bar before they were recruited in the subordinate judicial service would be entitled for being appointed as a District Judge/Additional District Judge in the selection process for the post of District Judges in the direct recruitment process; A candidate applying as an in-service candidate should have seven years’ combined experience as a Judicial Officer and an advocate; A person who has been or who is in judicial service and has a combined experience of seven years or more as an advocate or a Judicial Officer would be eligible for being considered and appointed as a District Judge/Additional District Judge under Article 233 of the Constitution- The minimum age for being considered and appointed as a District Judge/Additional District Judge for both advocates and Judicial Officers would be 35 years of age as on the date of application. (Para 172) - SC overruled its earlier judgments that had held that filling the post of district judge by direct recruitment could be filled in only by advocates/pleaders - This judgment will be applicable only from the date of this judgment and in no case, any selection process completed, or any appointment made prior to this judgment would be affected,except in cases wherein any interim order(s) were passed by the High Courts or Supreme Court. (Para 169-170)

Constitution of India - Article 233 - SC rejected the contention that 25% quota of direct recruitment is reserved only for practising advocates. (Para 164)

Constitution of India - Article 233 - Only such persons working either as an advocate/pleader including Government Pleaders and Public Prosecutors or as a judicial officer who, on the date of application, have a continuous experience of either an advocate/pleader or a judicial officer or a combination thereof shall only be eligible to be considered for appointment as district judges through the stream of direct recruitment - If a person has practised for five years and thereafter, he takes a break of ten years and thereafter practises for two years, there will be a disconnect with the legal profession. (Para 163)

Constitution of India - Article 233 -All matters pertaining to appointment of a person to the post of a district judge, his posting and promotion are covered under clause (1) of Article 233 of the Constitution. Even the appointment as a district judge by promotion is covered by Article 233(1) of the Constitution. (Para 156)

Interpretation of Statutes - Interpretation of the constitutional provisions cannot be pedantic. It has to be organic. A purposeful interpretation has to be adopted. (Para 153) The interpretation which makes the textual interpretation match the contextual one has to be preferred. A statute is best interpreted when the reason and purpose for its enactment is ascertained. The statute must be read first as a whole, and then section by section, clause by clause, phrase by phrase and word by word. It has been held that if the statute is looked at in the context of its enactment with the glasses of the statute-maker, provided by such context, its scheme, the sections, clauses, phrases and words may take colour and appear different than when the statute is looked at without the glasses provided by the context. With these “glasses” we must look at the Act as a whole and discover what each section, each clause, each phrase and each word means and what it is designed to say as to fit into the scheme of the entire Act. No part of a statute and no word of a statute can be construed in isolation. (Para 115)

Public Employment - The object of any process of selection for entry into a public service should be to secure the best and the most suitable person for the job. (Para 150)

Bar Council of India Rules- An advocate who joins the judicial service only suspends his right to practice and continues to be on the roll of the State Bar Council.  (Para 143-145)

Advocates Act, 1961 - Sections 29, 30 and 33 ; Bar Council of India Rules- Rule 49- An employee cannot get enrolled in the rolls of the State Bar Council without giving up his employment. A law graduate who is enrolled as an Advocate on taking up regular employment as full time salaried employee is obliged to intimate the fact to the Bar Council in which he is enrolled and would then seize to practice as an Advocate so long as he continues such employment. Failure to make such intimation can result in his name being struck off from the Rolls. Reading Sections 29, 30 and 33 of the Advocates Act, 1961 together with Rule 49 of the Bar Council of India Rules, an employee, even if he is in the Rolls of the State Bar Council, as long as he remains a fully salaried employee, on intimation of the regular employment would be prohibited from carrying on practice of law as an Advocate. (Para 141)

Judicial Officers’ Experience Greater Than That Of Practising Advocates: Supreme Court In District Judge Recruitment Case

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