There Has Never Been A Woman CJI; Greater Women Representation In Judiciary Will Help Balanced Approach In Sexual Violence Cases: AG KK Venugopal

Attorney General KK Venugopal, in his written submissions filed in an SLP filed by women lawyers against Madhya Pradesh High Court's 'Rakhi' Bail order, stated that improving the representation of women in the judiciary could also go a long way towards a more balanced and empathetic approach in cases involving sexual violence. "For instance, this Court only has 2 women judges, as against a sanctioned strength of 34 judges. There has never been a female Chief Justice of India.", AG KK Venugopal said.Supreme Court advocate Aparna Bhat and eight other women lawyers have challenged (before the Apex Court) one of the Bail Conditions in the Bail Order dated July 30 passed by Madhya Pradesh High Court, wherein the Court had imposed a bail condition upon the person (accused of outraging the modesty of his neighbour) to request the victim to tie the rakhi around his wrist. In this case, the Court had requested the Attorney General to assist it in the matter.In the written submission, the Attorney general pointed out that the representation of women is consistently low across the Higher Judiciary. He noted:i. There are only 80 women judges out of the total sanctioned strength of 1,113 judges in the High Courts and the Supreme Court across India.ii. Out of these 80 women judges, there are only two in the Supreme Court, and the other 78 are in various High Courts, comprising only 7.2 per cent of the total number of judges iii. Of the 26 courts whose data was accessed, including the Supreme Court, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has the maximum strength of women judges (11 out of 85 judges) in the country, followed by the Madras High Court (9 out of 75 judges). There are eight women judges in both Delhi and Bombay High Courts.iv. There are six High Courts, which consists of Manipur, Meghalaya, Patna, Tripura, Telangana, and Uttarakhand, where no sitting judges include any woman judge. At the same time, there is an only one-woman judge in six other High Courts of the country. v. Currently, no data is centrally maintained on the number of women in tribunals or lower courts.AG KK Venugopal further submitted that there are only 17 women senior counsel designates in the Supreme Court, as opposed to 403 men. He submitted:To remedy this, this Court must: i. Direct collection of data to determine the number of women judges in the lower judiciary ii. Direct collection of data to determine the number of women judges in tribunals iii. Direct collection of data to determine number of senior designates by all High Courts, year wise iv. Ensure greater representation of women at all levels of the judiciary, including the Supreme Court. This initiative must come from the Supreme Court itself, considering that the power of appointment rests almost exclusively with the Supreme Court Collegium. The goal must be to achieve at least 50% representation of women in all leadership positions.Click here to Read/Download Written Submission

There Has Never Been A Woman CJI; Greater Women Representation In Judiciary Will Help Balanced Approach In Sexual Violence Cases: AG KK Venugopal

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