Justice Rastogi backs CJI Thakur's appeal to increase number of judges

Jaipur: Acting Chief Justice of the Rajasthan High Court Ajay Rastogi on Sunday backed Chief Justice of India (CJI) TS Thakur's appeal to increase the number of judges in order to handle the "avalanche" of litigations, and urged the government to resolve the matter.

In an exclusive interview to ETV News head Jagdish Chandra, Justice Rastogi said the issue of shortage of judges in the judiciary is a long pending one.

"High courts are lacking the judges. Chief Justice of India has been taking up the matter of vacancies for a long. Government must now resolve this matter," he said in ETV's popular 'The JC Show'.

"There is no discrimination in appointments even though it takes a bit of time. Very soon the judges will be appointed in the Rajasthan HC. Collegium has cleared. Some of them are retired," he added.

Last week, Chief Justice of India (CJI) TS Thakur made a poignant appeal to increase the number of judges, to which Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was present at the event, assured him of the government's intervention.

"It is not enough to criticise, you cannot shift the entire burden to the judiciary. If you compare performances of our judges to the other countries, we are head and shoulder above them. Speeches have been made in past, people have spoken in conference, there's been debate in Parliament. But I think nothing really appears to be moving," CJI Thakur had said at the Joint Conference of Chief Ministers and Chief Justices on April 24.

In response, Prime Minister Modi said that he understood the Chief Justice's concern and added that that going forward, he hoped that the Government and the Judiciary could work together to find solutions to these issues.