2019 – Posted in: Daily News – Tags: Supreme Court of India

THE SUPREME COURT (NUMBER OF JUDGES) ACT, 1956

For: Preliminary & Mains

Topics covered: Increasing strength of Supreme Court judges, The Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Act, 1956

Cabinet approves the increasing strength of Supreme Court judges from 31 to 34 (including Chief Justice of India).

The Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Act, 1956 was last amended in 2009 to increase the judges’ strength from 25 to 30 (excluding the CJI).
The Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Act, 1956 originally provided for a maximum of 10 judges (excluding the CJI).
This number was increased to 13 by the Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Amendment Act, 1960, and to 17 in 1977.
The working strength of the Supreme court was, however, restricted to 15 judges by the Cabinet (excluding the chief Justice of India) till the end of 1979.
But the restriction was withdrawn at the request of the Chief Justice of India.
In 1986, the strength of the top court was increased to 25, excluding the CJI. Subsequently, the Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Amendment Act, 2009 further augmented the strength of the court from 25 to 30.

According to a written reply by the Law Ministry to a Rajya Sabha question on July 11, 59,331 cases are pending in the Supreme court.

The Supreme Court is the highest judicial court and the final court of appeal under the Constitution of India.
Consisting of the Chief Justice of India and a maximum of 31 judges (presently), it has extensive powers in the form of original, appellate and advisory jurisdictions.
It safeguards the fundamental rights of citizens and settles disputes between various government authorities as well as the central government vs state governments or state governments versus another state government in the country.

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