Institute of Legal and Management Studies

The Supreme Court yesterday, while hearing the challenge to the Tribunals Reforms Act, 2021, was informed of the issue of appointments to the tribunals being made from the wait list candidates over those in the merit list.

The Bench comprising Chief Justice of India B.R. Gavai and Justice K. Vinod Chandran was hearing the Madras Bar Association case concerning the validity of the Tribunals Reforms Act, 2021.

Sr Advocate Arvind Datar, appearing for the petitioners, mainly expanded upon his previous arguments that the impugned Act's provisions were contrary to the previous judgments of the Court. He flagged the following provisions - (1) minimum age requirement of 50 years to be Tribunal members; (2) search-cum selection committee mandating the recommendation of two persons for the post of Chairperson; (3) 4 years tenure for a tribunal's member/ chairperson. According to him, these provisions are contrary the earlier judgments of the Supreme Court in Madras Bar Association cases.

Datar stressed that the provision of having two names for recommendation for the post of Chairperson should not be there. He added that the selection should take place as per the merit list, instead of appointing persons from the waiting list, overlooking candidates within the merit list.

He cited the instance where, for the appointments to ITAT in 2018, out of the 21 vacancies for judicial members, there were 28 recommendations by the Search cum Selection Committee (SSC) from the main merit list and 13 from the waiting list. Ultimately, 16 from the merit list were considered, and 6 from the wait list were considered.

"So in the data, it shows that they have skipped the main list and gone to the waiting list."

Sr Advocates Gopal Sankarnarayanan and Porus F Kaka, appearing for intervenors, also raise the issue of appointments being preferred from the wait list over the merit list. They mainly stressed that candidates from the merit list were being dropped in the selection process because of certain IB reports flagging negative comments against them after their names got recommended by the SSC.

However, it was emphasised that the IB reports never reached the SSC. In some cases, candidates with way lower rankings were given preference, signalling an unreasonable 'cherry picking'.

Attorney General R Venkataramani for the Union will make his submissions on Monday.

Case Title: MADRAS BAR ASSOCIATION Versus UNION OF INDIA AND ANR., W.P.(C) No. 1018/2021