After the Supreme Court proposed 77 names for appointment as high court judges, the Centre on Friday informed the court that it had rejected 43 of those names, as being unsuitable.

The Centre returned the appointments for reconsideration by the collegium. Chief Justice of India (CJI) TS Thakur said the objections would be verified when the collegium meets on November 15, as per a report by Dhananjay Mahapatra in the Times of India.  

Attorney general Mukul Rohatgi said, “There is no recommendation for appointment of judges pending with the government. Our slate is clean. We have appointed 34 of the recommended names as HC judges and the rest 43 have been returned for reconsideration.”

During the hearing on October 28, the Supreme Court had blamed the government’s delaying tactics for the large number of pending vacancies in the appointment of high court judges. “We cannot sit over a situation where the executive attempts to lock out the judiciary and attempts its decimation,” the bench had said. Rohatgi had then sought two weeks time.

Rohatgi said, “The government had sent a draft MoP (Memorandum of Procedure) to the Supreme Court for consideration by the CJI and collegium members. The government is yet to receive any response from the Supreme Court.”

On October 16 last year, Justice JS Khehar who will become the CJI on January 3, had dismissed the National Judicial Appointments Commission as unconstitutional.