Supreme Court asks Centre to explore Article 224A for Tripura High Court

The Supreme Court today asked Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi to explore the possibility of using Article 224A to solve the Tripura High Court’s peculiar problem..As was reported earlier, the High Court of Tripura is facing a unique problem. Owing to the shortage of judges (the Court only has a judge strength of three as against the sanctioned strength of four), recusals have been made difficult for the sitting judges..When the matter was taken up today, Rohatgi suggested solutions including transferring judges from other states and ensuring that the High Court functions at full strength..The Bench comprising Chief Justice JS Khehar and Justices NV Ramana and DY Chandrachud then pitched the idea of invoking Article 224-A..Article 224A deals with appointment of retired judges to high courts. It states,.“…the Chief Justice of a High Court for any State may at any time, with the previous consent of the President, request any person who has held the office of a Judge of that Court or of any other High Court to sit and act as a Judge of the High Court for that State…”.The suggestion was followed by the Attorney General’s lukewarm response to the idea..The Bench has now mooted the idea of asking the Registrar General of the concerned High Court to seek the permission of the parties in whose cases a recusal is to be sought, to have their cases dealt with by the Gauhati High Court..Of course, that would not be a permanent solution, and whether Article 224-A will be implemented remains to be seen..Recently, the Central government had received names of 18 retired judges for appointment to four High Courts under Article 224-A..The names were received from the High Courts of Andhra Pradesh & Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, Allahabad and Calcutta, and are “under process”..Senior Advocate Arvind Datar had also advocated the need to implement Article 224-A, a provision he described as the “Forgotten Article”.