Supreme Court To Hear Plea To Consider Law Officers' Experience Towards 3 Year Practice For Judicial Service

The Supreme Court has agreed to consider an application seeking that law officers' work experience in public sector undertakings (PSUs) be also counted towards the 3-year practice rule for entering judicial service.The application was mentioned on July 13 before a bench of CJI Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice V Mohana during the hearing of the All India Judges Association case. It was filed by AoR Anuja Pethia and argued by Advocate Vanshaja Shukla.The CJI said that the application would be considered along with the pleas seeking review of the Court's 2025 judgment on the 3-year practice rule.Briefly put, the application has been filed by law officers serving under the Government of India seeking to join the judicial service by appearing in the Civil Judge (Junior Division) Exam. They seek parity with the treatment accorded in the 2025 judgment to Law Clerks of Judges and judicial officers (whose experience is to be counted towards the 3-year practice period).It is stated that Law Officers regularly attend court proceedings, coordinate with advocates, prepare and review pleadings, etc., which enables them to gain requisite qualities of a Civil Judge. Besides, the applicants highlight, Law Officers are selected through a competitive recruitment process and discharge various legal functions, other than litigation management (such as statutory compliances).The application underlines that many applicants hail from modest backgrounds, who were constrained to leave practice and take up other employment due to financial constraints and family obligations, while continuing to prepare for judicial service. One of the applicants infact suffers from over 40% vision disability."The exclusion of Law Officers from similar consideration, despite their experience, results in an arbitrary and unfair classification and undermines the principle of equality...Treating their experience as irrelevant not only restricts the pool of deserving candidates but also disregards the very objective of maturity, preparedness, and professional exposure that the three-year requirement is intended to serve", the application states.To recap, in May 2025, the Supreme Court restored the condition that a minimum practice of three years as an advocate is necessary for a candidate to apply for entry-level posts in judicial service. The period of practice could be reckoned from the date of provisional enrollment and the said condition was to apply only to future recruitments.This judgment revived the earlier requirement, which had been relaxed in 2002, and held that prior courtroom experience was essential to ensure competence and maturity among judicial officers at the trial level.Seeking review of the judgment, one Chandra Sen Yadav, a practising advocate, filed a petition in June 2025, contending that the mandate for 3-year practice was imposed by the Court ignoring certain crucial observations made by the Shetty Commission.He submitted that the Court's direction was based solely on the affidavits filed by certain High Courts and State Governments which supported the reinstatement of the condition for legal practice before entering judicial service. However, the contrary recommendations made by the States of Nagaland, Tripura, the High Court of Punjab and Haryana, and the State of Chhattisgarh, which opposed the said requirement, were not wholly considered by the Court.According to the review petitioner, the Shetty Commission recommended removal of the practice requirement, considering the fact that court visits and internships are part of the curriculum of the law degree. This aspect was not considered by the Supreme Court. Also, since the candidates undergo training before entering service, the practice condition might not be necessary.It was also argued that the judgment did not cite any factual data, statistics, or studies to establish that fresh law graduates perform poorly as judges. Further, no consideration was given to the number or success rate of fresh law graduates who have historically performed well in judicial services and have served effectively on the bench after undergoing training.After issuing notice in the review petitions, the Supreme Court allowed open Court hearing of the same in February this year.Case Title: ALL INDIA JUDGES ASSOCIATION AND ORS. Versus UNION OF INDIA AND ORS., W.P.(C) No. 1022/1989

Supreme Court To Hear Plea To Consider Law Officers' Experience Towards 3 Year Practice For Judicial Service

Debby Jain

The law officers have filed the plea seeking parity with law clerks, whose experience is to be counted towards the 3-year practice rule as per Supreme Court's judgment.

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Debby Jain

Supreme Court To Hear Plea To Consider Law Officers' Experience Towards 3 Year Practice For Judicial Service

Debby Jain

The law officers have filed the plea seeking parity with law clerks, whose experience is to be counted towards the 3-year practice rule as per Supreme Court's judgment.

This is a premium content Available exclusively to Our subscribers

INR 1099+GST

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Debby Jain

This is a premium content
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