Report No. 14
61. Allotment to other States.-
As in the case of the other All-India Services, persons selected for the All-India Judicial Service will be allotted to a particular State and will form part of the judiciary of that State for the rest of their service. However, in order to foster an all-India outlook which is of vital importance to the nation, we suggest that as a rule the Indian Judicial Service officers should be allotted to States other than their own States.
62. Training (In the I.A.S. School).-
An officer selected for the Indian Judicial Service should, in our view, be given an intensive training for a period of two years before he starts his judicial career. To begin with, he will undergo the training that is at present being given to persons selected for the Indian Administrative Service in the Training School. It is essential that for a period, the training of the future executive officers and the future judicial officers should proceed pari passu and in association with one another. We have found that in maintaining the efficiency of judicial administration, the district judge has to depend a great deal upon the executive officers for their co-operation.
It has been generally noticed that a district judge borne on the cadre of the Indian Civil Service is able to secure the co-operation of the other officers in a larger degree than a district judge belonging to the State service. This perhaps is psychological. However, that may be, we must make use of every factor which may help to make judicial administration more efficient. Officers of the Indian Judicial Service, if trained in close association with those of the Indian Administrative Service, will in the future stages of their career as judicial officers, be able to obtain all necessary co-operation from their colleagues of the Indian Administrative Service.
The course which has been prescribed for the one year period of probation of the Indian Administrative Service officer, includes a study of the principles of the Constitution, of the Indian criminal law, general administrative knowledge, such as, Indian History in its social, political and economic aspects, general principles of administration, organization of Government institutions and the regional language of the State to which he is allotted.
These subjects would, in our view, be equally useful to a judicial officer. We may, however, suggest that in order to render this period of training in the Indian Administrative Service School of more practical value to the Indian Judicial Service officer, some additional subjects like Economics and Commercial law with, particular reference to the civil procedure, company law, insolvency, banking and insurance, should also be included in the course of instruction at the school.
63. Training in the States (In the District) (In the High Court).-
The training at the Indian Administrative Service School for a year should be followed by a further period of intensive training in the State to which the officer is allotted. The officer will be subjected to this training side by side with members of the subordinate judiciary recruited at the State level. We have earlier prescribed the nature of this training. This period of training for the Indian Judicial Service officer in the State will have, however, to be longer, by reason of his unfamiliarity with courts of law. It should, we think, extend to a period of one year which will include a three months' training in the revenue matters, a two months' training in the police department and five months under a selected district judge.
It may be advantageous to give the officer some idea of how cases are prepared by posting him for training for a short period under the Government Pleader or the Public Prosecutor. In order that the officer may have some idea of work in the High Court, we also recommend that he should work as a legal assistant to a selected High Court judge for a period of two months. During this period he will be able to familiarize himself with the High Court procedure beginning with the institution of civil and criminal matters upto their final disposal. He would also be able to train himself by preparing exhaustive notes and summaries in some matters to be heard by the judge to whom he is attached.
This personal contact with the High Court judge will enable him to get an intimate understanding of how complicated legal problems are approached and dealt with in the High Courts. He would also be able to watch the methods of work of experienced judges. The period of training in the High Court should also familiarize the officer with the methods by which the work of the subordinate courts is reviewed. At the end of a training such as we have suggested, the officer could well be entrusted with the responsibility of doing judicial work.
64. Work as a magistrate (As a munsif and subordinate judge) (Promotion as district judge).-
After the training, the officer will be posted as a magistrate. Care will have to be taken in States where separation of the judiciary from the executive has not yet been effected to see that he is under the control and supervision of the High Court and not the executive. This should present no difficulty. Cases could be transferred to him from time to time for disposal. After a period of not less than three years has been spent by him as a magistrate exercising progressively increasing powers, the officer can be posted to the civil side starting as a junior civil judge.
In some of the States where separation has been effected, the posts of magistrates and munsifs are borne on the same cadre. In these States, the officer will work as a munsif for not less than three years before he is promoted to higher posts and works as a subordinate judge or senior civil judge or an assistant sessions judge as the case may be. After three or four years' experience in these higher posts, he will be fit for being posted as a district and sessions judge.
65. Emoluments in subordinate posts (As District Judge).-
In the scheme we have proposed, the emoluments of the posts in the Indian Judicial Service will be the same as those in the Indian Administrative Service. These officers will therefore draw a higher remuneration when working as magistrates, munsifs and subordinate judges than their counter-parts in the State services. On appointment, however, as district and sessions judges their remuneration will be the same as that of persons occupying these posts who are not members of the Indian Judicial Service.
Our main purpose in recommending the institution of an All India Service is to bring men of talent into the higher judicial service. These officers will, therefore, after their training for two years, have to be taken quickly through the rungs of the subordinate judicial service so as to reach the position of district and sessions judges in a period of about ten years.
66. Rapid promotion-a possible criticism.-
It may appear somewhat unjust that an Indian Judicial Service officer should rise to the position of a district and sessions judge in the short period of about ten years while a person recruited as a junior civil judge at the State level should have fifteen to twenty years in service before he can attain that position. We do not think that this would be unjust. It • must be remembered that the young man who has preferred to enter the service at the State level could have, if he had chosen, attempted to enter the service at the all-India level. He has not chosen to do so probably because he did not command the talent, which would have enabled him to enter it by that door or has not been successful in his effort.
What is clear is that the entrance to the service at the all-India level will remain open to every one who chooses to attempt to enter it by that door. Further, it has to be remembered that every officer recruited as a civil judge (munsif) does not reach the post of a district and sessions judge. That post is a key post in the judicial administration of the State. A district and sessions judge is the highest judicial authority in the district and is responsible for its judicial administration in all aspects. Normally only one in ten persons recruited as munsifs can aspire to reach this selection post.
67. Integration with the State Services (Forty per cent. of superior posts to be reserved for the I.J.S.) (Thirty per cent. for promotion) (Thirty per cent. for direct recruitment from the Bar) (Case of Smaller States).-
A further question which needs consideration is whether All India Service element which we have proposed can be integrated into the State Judicial Service. We see no difficulty in bringing this about. Such an integration is in force in the case of other all-India Services and identical principles can be made applicable to this case. In the Indian Administrative Service and the Indian Police Service the cadre strength at the higher levels is made up of seventy-five per cent. of directly recruited personnel at the all-India level and twenty-five per cent. personnel filled by promotion from the lower ranks recruited at the State level.
The scheme, we envisage, will be on the following lines:-The recruitment at the lowest level of the judicial machinery viz., of civil judges junior division (munsifs) will be made at the State level. Persons so recruited will be eligible for promotion to the higher posts of civil judges senior division (subordinate judges). The State Judicial Service Class I (the higher judicial service) will consist of the offices of the district and sessions judges, additional district and sessions judges, civil and sessions judges, Chief presidency magistrates and other posts for which an officer of the status of a district and sessions judge is necessary.
Insofar as State Judicial Service Class I (higher judicial service) is concerned, we would suggest that forty per cent. of these posts be reserved for members of the Indian Judicial Service which we have proposed. Of the remaining sixty per cent. thirty per cent. may be left to be filled by promotion from ranks of State Judicial Service Class II (subordinate judicial service) and thirty pe.-cent. to be filled up by direct recruitment from members of the Bar of sufficient seniority and standing. The proportions we have recommended may, however, have to be suitably altered in the smaller States like Assam and Orissa where the number of district judges is small. Another method of dealing with such States would be to have a combined cadre for two States, a big State and a small neighbouring State being taken together.
68. Opposition to the scheme.-
The scheme of recruitment to the higher judicial service, partly by the constitution of an all-India Judicial Service, met with considerable opposition from some members of the subordinate judiciary and from certain bodies representing the subordinate judiciary who have sent representations to us. It was urged that .the personnel recruited at the all-India level will be deficient in experience as compared with the personnel recruited by promotion from the subordinate judiciary. We have dealt separately with this aspect of the matter. It is true, that the recruits at the all-India level will have shorter judicial experience before they reach the level of district and sessions judges but this will be amply compensated for, by the greater talent they will possess and the more intensive training to which they will be subjected.
69. Unfairness to the State Services.-
A further objection to our proposal was that it would unfairly affect the chances of promotion to the higher judicial service which persons in the lower judicial service now have and that in the result, the lower subordinate judiciary will be deprived of all incentive to efficient work. It appears to us that the reservation of thirty per cent. of posts to be recruited by promotion which we propose will not substantially reduce the posts now available to the subordinate judiciary in the higher judiciary. The Table set out below shows the number of posts in the lower State judicial service and the higher State judicial service in the various States during the year 1955.
Table Showing The Number of Posts In The State Judicial Service and Higher Judicial Service In Various States In The Year 1955, and The Allocation of Posts In The Higher Judicial Service to Indian Judicial Service ETC.
State Judicial Service |
Higher Judicial Service |
Allocation of posts in the Higher Judicial Service |
||||||||
Name of the State |
Munsifs |
Subordinate Judges |
Assistance District Judges and corresponding posts |
District Judges |
Total of 4 and 5 |
Percentage of posts in Higher Service |
I.J.S. |
Promotion |
Direct Recruitment |
|
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
|
Andhra |
54 |
18 |
.. |
10 |
10 |
12.2 |
4 |
3 |
3 |
|
Assam |
22 |
7 |
5 |
10 |
2536 |
4 |
3 |
3 |
||
Bihar |
232 |
71 |
.. |
41 |
41 |
11.9 |
17 |
12 |
12 |
|
Bombay |
231 |
30 |
31 |
28+37 |
93 |
26.2 |
37 |
28 |
28 |
|
Kerala |
53 |
6 |
13 |
9 |
22 |
27 |
8 |
7 |
7 |
|
Madhya Pradedsh |
95 |
41 |
.. |
14 |
14 |
9.3 |
6 |
4 |
4 |
|
Madras |
117 |
31 |
.. |
19 |
19 |
11.3 |
6 |
6 |
6 |
|
Mysore |
52 |
18 |
.. |
10 |
10 |
12.5 |
4 |
3 |
3 |
|
Orissa |
46 |
15 |
.. |
12 |
12 |
16.3 |
5 |
4 |
3 |
|
Punjab |
123 |
.. |
.. |
21 |
21 |
14.6 |
9 |
6 |
6 |
|
Rajasthan |
80 |
30 |
20 |
18 |
38 |
25.6 |
14 |
12 |
12 |
|
Uttar Pradesh |
163 |
59 |
45 |
39 |
84 |
27 |
34 |
25 |
25 |
|
West Bengal |
121 |
49 |
.. |
44 |
44 |
20.6 |
18 |
13 |
13 |
|
70. Objection answered.-
The above Table shows that the percentage of posts in the higher State judicial service ranges between 10 and 20 per cent. of the total number of posts in the judicial services of the State. It will thus appear that only a small proportion of the officers in the lower judicial service can expect to reach the higher judicial service. The Table also shows the number of posts that will be filled if our proposal is accepted, by recruits of the Indian Judicial Service, by personnel promoted from the subordinate judiciary and by direct recruitment from the Bar.
An examination of columns three and nine reveals that the number of posts that will be available to persons promoted from the subordinate judiciary will not be small. The posts borne on the higher judicial service cadre must necessarily be regarded as selection posts which may be filled only by persons of adequate merit and ability. These posts cannot be regarded as posts to which an officer should expect promotion in the normal course. We have elsewhere expressed our strong disapproval of the present method of promoting officers merely on the basis of seniority.
The apprehensions of lower State subordinate judiciary are, no doubt, accentuated by the state of affairs which now prevails in a number of States. Apart from promotion having been regulated by mere seniority, the large demand for judicial officers had led to abnormal expectations of promotion to the higher cadre of members of the lower subordinate judiciary.
71. No injustice to the State Service (Raising proportion of the Indian Judicial Service).-
Comparing the situation which will result from the adoption of our proposal with the position in other departments where officers of the all-India Services are recruited, one finds that only twenty-five per cent. of the cadre strength at the higher levels is available for persons promoted from the lower services. The percentage therefore which we have fixed does, in our opinion, no injustice to members of the subordinate judicial service.
In fact, we should have been inclined to fix a higher percentage for the Indian Judicial Service element in order to achieve our purpose of raising the tone and level of the judiciary but for the consideration that a certain percentage of these posts should be open to the really talented men available in the lower judicial service. It may be that when the scheme, which we have proposed is found to yield satisfactory results, a case would have been made out for the increase of the percentage of recruits at the all-India level to a higher figure.
In any case to suggest that an essential scheme of reform affecting the subordinate judiciary as a whole should be held up in order that the existing personnel may not lose their chances of promotion would be "to disclose an incapacity to see things in proper focus".
72. A criticism.-
It was observed by a Chief Justice in reference to our proposal that "If the higher status or the higher salary is kept limited to the direct recruits, the inevitable result will be that a higher caste of officers will spring up within the Service in no time and the members of that caste, being recruited directly to the higher subordinate judiciary at very young ages, will soon form a block at the top, to whom all further preferment will necessarily be limited.
The former, being appointed directly to the topmost rank of the district judiciary at a comparatively early age, would soon acquire a position of seniority and would be earning a much higher remuneration, while the promoters from the lower subordinate judiciary, who are older men of much longer judicial experience, would be straggling far behind, unless proper adjustments of rank and salary were made In my view, it will be a combination or assemblage of incompatibles. Very young men, recruited directly by the method of a competitive test, men of middle age, recruited directly from the Bar and men of fairly advanced ages, recruited by promotion will make a very miscellaneous company which is likely to breed a sense of maladjustment, if not jealousies or contempts."
73. Answered.-
In the scheme, proposed by us, there is not any disparity of remuneration after the direct recruits or those otherwise recruited, have reached the higher judiciary. No doubt, during the period of the direct recruits' tenure of posts in the lower judicial service, he will be drawing a higher remuneration than the magistrates or munsifs or subordinate judges in the service. There will undoubtedly be a disparity of age between direct recruit and the person who may be recruited by promotion from the lower services or from the Bar.
Such a disparity, however, exists in many services in which recruitment takes place at different levels and from different sources and has not so far led to any disharmony or inefficiency. As the prospects of promotion of the recruits, direct or otherwise, would be equal, the more capable of them being promoted to the selection posts it may well be that the district and sessions judge drawn from the cadre of the subordinate judiciary may, in preference to a direct recruit occupying a like position, be selected to be a judge of the High Court as has happened in the past.
74. Language difficulties.-
A somewhat faint objection to the scheme proposed by us was raised on the ground that a person recruited at the all-India level sent to a State other than his own would be unfamiliar with the language of the State and will not, therefore, ably and efficiently discharge his duties as a judicial officer. We have already recommended that the training, which he has to receive, should include a knowledge of the regional language of the State to which he is allotted. In fact, a similar situation arises in respect of officers of the other all-India Services like the Administrative and the Police Services, when officers posted to one State come from another State. We have not been informed of any difficulties having been experienced by officers in discharging their duties on this score.
75. Other objections.-
It has also been suggested that, if the emoluments of the posts in the Indian Judicial Service are the same as those in the Indian Administrative Service, the more capable candidates may prefer the Administrative Service or the Foreign Service or the Police and other Central Services as the qualification of a degree in law will not be necessary for competing in those Services. We do not think that there is any force in this suggestion. So far as the Indian Police and other Services are concerned, the remuneration offered to those selected to them will be less than the remuneration which an Indian Judicial Service officer will get.
Moreover, the Indian Judicial Service will have attractions of its own, some of them not available even to members of the Indian Administrative Service who will have a comparable remuneration. A judicial officer, unlike an executive officer, lives a life of independence unaffected by the frowns and favours of a superior. Indeed, we were informed by the Chief Justice of a State that he had met some I.A.S. officers who would like to be transferred from the executive service to the higher judicial service, if such a transfer was possible. An officer of the Indian Judicial Service may rise to the status of a High Court Judge, the like of which cannot be attained by an officer in the I.A.S. or the I.F.S.
76. Direct recruitment from the Bar necessary.-
We have already indicated that the proportion of direct recruits from the senior members of the Bar to posts of the State Judicial Service-Class I should be thirty per cent. We have stated earlier the proportions in which direct recruitment from the Bar take place in various States. There is a clear advantage in having different fields of recruitment so that one may be able to catch talent from any field. It has happened that persons who did not succeed in being appointed munsifs have, in later years, been recruited as assistant or district judges, or even after long practice at the Bar as High Court judges.
It is, therefore, only fair that the Bar which has so far been the main recruiting ground to the judicial service should have an appropriate quota of direct recruitment to the higher judiciary. Though the percentage of thirty which we have suggested means a reduced quota in some of the States, it is, we consider, a fair proportion, having regard to the scheme of direct recruitment at the all-India level suggested by us.
77. Qualifications.-
In most of the States, the prescribed qualifications for direct recruits to the higher judicial service are seven years' practice at the Bar and age between thirty-five and forty-five years. In Orissa, however, the required length of practice at the Bar is ten years and in Madhya Pradesh the maximum limit of age is forty years. We are of the view that the requirement of a practice of seven years and an upper age limit of forty years should be uniformly adopted in all the States.
78. No training necessary.-
In our view, it is not necessary to prescribe any period of training for persons recruited direct from the Bar in this manner. Recruits from the Bar, with a minimum practice of seven years and in many cases with much longer practice, will ordinarily be completely familiar with court procedure and like matters. We have referred to this matter as we found that in some States the rules require these recruits to undergo training for a period of one year.
79. Pay scales of judicial officers-Diversity in pay scales.-
An analysis of the pay structure of the judicial service in various States reveals considerable disparity in the pay scales as to (1) the minimum and the maximum of the scales, (2) length of the time-scale of the pay, (3) rates of increments, and (4) the stages of the efficiency bar. Taking, for example, the pay scales of munsifs, the minimum starting salary ranges between Rs. 220 in Bihar and Rs. 350 in Uttar Pradesh. In Orissa, a munsif starts at Rs. 230, in Kerala, Mysore, Rajasthan and West Bengal at Rs. 250, and in Andhra Pradesh, Bombay and Madras at Rs. 300. Likewise, the maximum of the scale ranges between Rs. 500 in Mysore and Rs. 850 in the Punjab and Uttar Pradesh.
There is also considerable difference in the length of their pay scales; the pay scale in Assam and Bihar is spread over twenty one years and in Mysore over eleven years. Apart from differences in the amount of increments, there are also differences in the intervals between increments; thus munsifs and subordinate judges in Andhra Pradesh and Madras and subordinate judges in Assam get biennial increments, whereas elsewhere all judicial officers get annual increments.
One also notices considerable differences with regard to the stages at which the efficiency bar is enforced. In Uttar Pradesh, the efficiency bar is placed after the fourth and the fourteenth year of service, in Bihar after the eighth and the fourteenth year, in Andhra Pradesh and Madras after the ninth year, in Kerala and the Punjab after the eleventh year, and in West Bengal after the tenth and the eighteenth year of service. Likewise, there are differences in the pay scales of subordinate judges, additional district judges, district judges and officers of corresponding rank.
80. Uniformity desirable.-
It is, in our view, desirable that officers doing exactly the same work, and having precisely the same qualifications should, as far as possible, be paid the same remuneration for similar work in different States. There is in our view no justification for the diverse scales of pay and increments now in force.
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