CJI Surya Kant widens case allocation across Supreme Court benches in new roster

The Supreme Court’s new roster, notified under the direction of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant on Monday, expands the range of subject categories assigned to benches, distributing a wider cross-section of commercial disputes, taxation, education, family law, environmental issues, and other civil and criminal matters among judges.Chief Justice of India Surya Kant. (PTI)The revised allocation, which took effect on October 26, marks a significant reshuffle from the roster introduced on July 13, with several judges taking on additional case categories. The changes broaden the mix of disputes handled by individual benches rather than confining them to a narrower set of subjects, while retaining the existing system of assigning fresh cases according to specified subject categories.One of the more notable changes is in the allocation to Justice MM Sundresh, whose roster now includes company law, competition law, direct taxation, educational institutions, environmental law, insolvency and bankruptcy, land acquisition and land laws, among other subjects. These categories were not part of his July allocation, which covered areas such as civil and criminal law, family disputes, election matters, judiciary-related cases, labour and industrial law, and service matters.Justice Vikram Nath’s allocation has also expanded considerably. Besides civil and criminal matters, educational institutions, election disputes, environmental law, family law and service matters, his new roster includes arbitration, aviation, banking, company law, compensation, competition law and consumer disputes. The changes bring a wider range of commercial and regulatory litigation within his assigned categories.The revised roster expands the spread of subjects before other benches. Justice Dipankar Datta, for instance, has been assigned family law, habeas corpus and preventive detention, land acquisition, land laws and lotteries, betting and gambling, in addition to a broad range of civil, criminal, commercial, taxation and service matters.Justice PS Narasimha’s allocation now expressly includes matters relating to bar councils, bar associations and advocates, family law, housing and municipal issues, and judiciary-related cases, alongside arbitration, company law, taxation, education, environmental law, insolvency and intellectual property disputes.The changes span across the board. Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra’s roster now covers a broad range of categories, including company law, competition law, consumer disputes, direct taxation, environmental law, insolvency, mining and land-related matters, alongside criminal, service and other civil disputes.Justice Aravind Kumar’s allocation similarly encompasses a wide range of civil, commercial, regulatory and public-law matters, including arbitration, banking, competition, consumer disputes, taxation, education, environmental law, insolvency, mining, religious endowments and service law.The revised distribution reflects changes in the roster of judges handling fresh cases. Justice Sandeep Mehta, whose name did not figure in the July notification, has been assigned civil law, consumer disputes, criminal law, capital punishment cases, labour and industrial law, motor vehicle matters, rent control, service law and transfer petitions.The allocation of subjects continues to overlap across benches, allowing multiple benches to deal with broad categories such as civil law, criminal law, taxation and service matters. The roster is therefore an administrative distribution of fresh cases rather than an exclusive specialisation system in which each subject is confined to one judge.The new roster expands the allocation of habeas corpus and preventive detention matters from four benches under the July roster—to be headed by the Chief Justice of India and Justices Vikram Nath, BV Nagarathna and MM Sundresh—to eight benches, adding Justices Dipankar Datta, Aravind Kumar, Prashant Kumar Mishra and KV Viswanathan. The wider distribution means these cases, which often involve challenges to personal liberty and the legality of detention, can now be listed before twice as many benches, although the roster itself does not indicate whether the change is intended to accelerate their disposal.The October notification retains the Chief Justice’s wider administrative framework for managing the court’s docket. Three-judge benches headed by the CJI, Justice Vikram Nath and Justice BV Nagarathna will mainly deal with three-judge matters on non-miscellaneous days -- Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.Separately, the roster continues the targeted allocation of older cases for regular hearings. Justice Dipankar Datta’s bench will deal with the oldest regular-hearing service matters on non-miscellaneous days, while benches headed by justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and SVN Bhatti will exclusively hear the oldest civil matters. The oldest criminal cases will similarly be taken up by benches headed by Justices Manoj Misra and Ujjal Bhuyan.The distinction is important: while the expanded subject allocation determines which benches receive fresh cases, the dedicated arrangements for older matters seek to ensure that long-pending litigation receives sustained attention rather than competing indefinitely with newer filings.