IMPORTANT POINTSAppellants are all eligible and suitable but they still say that the "reported recommendations"(sic) ought not have been made because the Collegium of this Court did not invite applications from all eligible advocates as if it is any other public office- There is, of course, a veiled insinuation against the afore respondents that they are "kith and kin" of Judges and of the Advocate General; but even so, they do not say that the said respondents are not eligible or suitable for being considered. The attempt of the appellants, therefore, is obviously to cast aspersions on the Collegium of Judges, but without in any manner substantiating it and thereby espousing their agenda of attempting an impossible declaration through this Court, that all the afore judgments of the Hon`ble Supreme Court are per incuriam.

Devan Ramachandran, J.

1. This appeal, arising from a writ petition filed with non-specific pleadings and seeking baffling reliefs, has confounded us in no small a measure.

2. To record epigrammatically, from among the maze of pleadings and materials on record, the petitioner contends that 'the collegium system', as enlivened by the various judgments of the Supreme Court, is illegal; that the judgments of the Supreme Court in, what is now known as the Second and Third Judges cases, do not lay down the law correctly, thus being unworthy of being followed as precedents; that the 'basic structure' theory, as postulated by the Hon'ble Supreme Court, is a 'myth' and finally that the expansion in the concepts of locus standi and Public Interest Litigation, made by the Hon'ble Supreme Court over the years, is now being put to misuse.

3. Amazed as we are seeing the pleadings on record and the submissions made before us on the above lines, we proceed to indite this judgment within the parameters of law and judicial discipline, as we are enjoined to.

4. The appellants, who are the writ petitioners, say in their pleadings that their proximate cause and constitutive reason for approaching this Court in these proceedings is because they have gathered information that respondents 6 to 10, who are practising Advocates of this Court, have been recommended by the Collegium of Judges for being elevated as Judges of the High Court of Kerala. The petitioners appear to be challenging these recommendations and they say that the writ petition, from which this appeal arises, has been instituted “for the enforcement of their fundamental and legal rights” (sic).

5. The writ petition was considered by a learned Judge of this Court and a detailed judgment delivered, however, dismissing it holding, inter alia, these issues to be not justiciable, and the appellants have impugned the said judgment in this appeal asserting that the learned Single Judge “has missed the obvious, to put it in the most polite way”(sic) and therefore, that the judgment is liable to be vacated, thus granting the reliefs prayed for by them in the writ petition.

6. Before we go any forward and with a view to explain why we made the prefatory observations afore, we deem it idoneous to extract the prayers sought for by the petitioners in the writ petition as under:

“Declare that the reported decision of the collegium of the Hon'ble High Court of Kerala, recommending the elevation of the respondents 6 to 10 as the judges of hon'ble High Court of Kerala is Null and Void being vitiated by extraneous and irrelevant considerations, namely kinship, and affinity, the respondents being the kith and kin of the former judges of the Court, so too of the Advocate General, rather than on merits;

(ii) Declare that Union of India and the Collegium of the Supreme Court of India is bound to enforce the policy of 1/3rd Judges of the High Courts to be from other high courts and the initial appointment to be a High Court other than that of the parent high court of the appointee concerned;

(iii) To declare that the interest of transparency and fairness requires that the vacancies in the august office of the judge of the High Court of Kerala and for that matter of every High Court in this country is liable to be notified, inviting applications from all eligible candidates, so too the recommendations and references from all stake holders and that an open and transparent selection and appointment be made, rendering any failure thereof to render the selection and appointment void-ab-initio;

(iv) To issue a writ of prohibition restraining and prohibiting the Union of India, so too the Collegium of the Supreme Court of India from acting upon the recommendations of the Collegium of the Hon'ble High Court of Kerala in so far as the elevation of respondents 6 to 10 are concerned and further to direct the Collegium to make a fresh recommendations where the ordinary lawyers who have no “godfathers” too are considere