{"id":2467,"date":"2026-10-06T08:31:54","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T08:31:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/2026\/10\/06\/three-judges-appointed-supreme-court-seniority-controversy\/"},"modified":"2026-10-06T08:31:54","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T08:31:54","slug":"three-judges-appointed-supreme-court-seniority-controversy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/2026\/10\/06\/three-judges-appointed-supreme-court-seniority-controversy\/","title":{"rendered":"Three judges appointed to India&#8217;s Supreme Court amid seniority controversy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<!-- Quick Adsense WordPress Plugin: http:\/\/quickadsense.com\/ -->\n<div class=\"9fece8afa224fd09e54b043d0febfb58\" data-index=\"1\" style=\"float: none; margin:10px 0 10px 0; text-align:center;\">\n<script async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script>\r\n<!-- NR ATF -->\r\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\r\n     style=\"display:block\"\r\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-8898941184964366\"\r\n     data-ad-slot=\"4839033563\"\r\n     data-ad-format=\"auto\"\r\n     data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins>\r\n<script>\r\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\r\n<\/script>\n<\/div>\n<p>President Droupadi Murmu cleared the appointments of three judges to the Supreme Court of India a week after the collegium\u2019s recommendation. Justice Sunita Agarwal, Chief Justice of the Gujarat High Court; Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya, Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court; and Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh, Chief Justice of the Telangana High Court will be sworn in on Tuesday, 6 October. Their elevation brings the strength of the apex court to 37 judges, with one vacancy still remaining. The number of women on the bench rises to three, while 34 men continue to serve.<\/p>\n<h2>Background and seniority dispute<\/h2>\n<p>The collegium\u2019s recommendation, announced on 28 September, reignited long\u2011standing concerns about the criteria used to supersede senior judges and the opacity of the selection process. Agarwal, Upadhyaya and Singh are ranked fourth, fifth and sixth respectively on the all\u2011India seniority list, thereby bypassing the three most senior judges. None of the three is in line to become Chief Justice of India.<\/p>\n<p>A separate report by The Leaflet noted that Justice Shree Chandrashekhar, appointed to the Supreme Court on 2 June, was junior to Justice Singh when the latter was passed over in June. With Singh\u2019s elevation, he will now join the Supreme Court as a junior to Justice Chandrashekhar, a reversal that the collegium did not explain.<\/p>\n<p>The collegium, which comprises the country\u2019s senior judges, did not provide reasons for selecting the three candidates, leaving legal analysts and bar associations to question the consistency of the seniority\u2011based convention that has guided appointments for decades.<\/p>\n<h2>Profiles of the new appointees<\/h2>\n<p><strong>Justice Sunita Agarwal<\/strong> was born in 1966 and began her legal career as an advocate at the Allahabad High Court. She was appointed a judge of that court in November 2011. In July 2023, the collegium led by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud elevated her to Chief Justice of the Gujarat High Court, making her the second woman to head the court.<\/p>\n<p>Her tenure in Gujarat has been marked by several high\u2011profile interventions. In February 2025, the Gujarat High Court Advocates\u2019 Association passed a resolution calling for her transfer, citing concerns over \u201cjudicial independence\u201d and roster changes. The Law Ministry responded by appointing Justice Biren Aniruddh Vaishnav as Acting Chief Justice while Justice Agarwal took a two\u2011week leave.<\/p>\n<p>On 29 September, a day after the collegium\u2019s recommendation, Justice Agarwal led a bench that dismissed former Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal\u2019s appeal against a 2023 Gujarat High Court order concerning the disclosure of Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s educational degrees. The court upheld a fine of \u20b925,000 imposed on Kejriwal, finding no larger public interest to justify disclosure under the Right to Information Act.<\/p>\n<p>Justice Agarwal has also taken suo motu cognizance of matters of public concern. In September 2023, following a report on alleged sexual harassment of two students at Gujarat National Law University, her bench criticized the university\u2019s initial response and noted an \u201covert anxious effort\u201d by the registrar to dilute the issue. A high\u2011level committee, including a former Supreme Court judge and the Attorney General of India, was later constituted to review the university\u2019s performance.<\/p>\n<p>Another suo motu action involved the tragic Harni Lake boat accident in January 2024, which claimed the lives of 12 schoolchildren and two teachers. The bench repeatedly questioned the Vadodara Municipal Corporation\u2019s supervision of the contractor and, in June 2024, found two former municipal commissioners prima facie guilty of dereliction of duty.<\/p>\n<p>Justice Agarwal also presided over a case stemming from a 2022 Gujarat government resolution to introduce the Bhagavad Gita\u2019s values, principles and prayers into the school curriculum for classes 6\u201112. While petitioners argued that the move violated the secular spirit of the National Education Policy and Article 28 of the Constitution, the Supreme Court declined to intervene, leaving the matter to the Gujarat High Court. In recent hearings, Justice Agarwal\u2019s bench described the petition as \u201cpropaganda\u201d and a \u201cstunt,\u201d suggesting that teaching the Gita could be framed as moral science rather than religious instruction.<\/p>\n<p>Before her transfer to Gujarat, Justice Agarwal was part of a seven\u2011judge Allahabad High Court bench that, in 2023, framed contempt charges against seven office\u2011bearers of the Kanpur Bar Association for continuing a strike deemed \u201cillegal and paralysing judicial work.\u201d Earlier, in 2021, a bench she sat on with Justice Sadhna Rani (Thakur) quashed habeas corpus orders against six anti\u2011CAA\u2011NRC protesters detained under the National Security Act, criticizing the administration for relying on vague and non\u2011existent grounds.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya<\/strong>, 61, also hails from the Allahabad High Court, where he began practising in 1991 and was appointed a judge in 2011 alongside Justice Agarwal. He became Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court in 2023 and was transferred to the Delhi High Court as Chief Justice in January 2025, making him the second judge from the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court to reach the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n<p>As Chief Justice of Delhi, Justice Upadhyaya played a pivotal role in the controversy surrounding Justice Yashwant Varma in March 2025, after burnt and unaccounted cash was discovered at Varma\u2019s official residence. Upadhyaya ordered an in\u2011house inquiry, gathered evidence and submitted a report to then Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna. The preliminary report indicated that four to five semi\u2011burnt stacks of Indian currency notes were found in a storeroom or outhouse.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh<\/strong> serves as Chief Justice of the Telangana High Court. Ranked sixth in the national seniority list, his elevation superseded three judges senior to him, echoing the seniority\u2011bypass controversy that surrounded his appointment. At the time of his elevation, Justice Singh was junior to Justice Shree Chandrashekhar, who had joined the Supreme Court in June. With Singh\u2019s appointment, he will now sit on the bench as a junior to Justice Chandrashekhar, a reversal that has not been publicly explained.<\/p>\n<p>While the new judges have not yet delivered judgments at the Supreme Court, their prior records suggest a mix of administrative assertiveness, suo motu activism and involvement in politically sensitive cases. Their appointments also raise broader questions about the collegium\u2019s transparency, the role of seniority in judicial promotions, and the growing presence of women on India\u2019s highest court.<\/p>\n\n<div style=\"font-size: 0px; height: 0px; line-height: 0px; margin: 0; padding: 0; clear: both;\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>President Droupadi Murmu approved three new Supreme Court judges, raising the bench to 37 members and sparking debate over seniority and transparency in the selection process.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2468,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[299],"tags":[216,2704,2705,335,2706],"class_list":["post-2467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-india","tag-judicial-appointments","tag-seniority","tag-supreme-court","tag-women-judges","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2467"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2467\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsraise.com\/in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}