A Policy that Needs Revision

While the transfers of High Court judges may be constitutionally permissible, they may not be necessary. Ending transfers of judges will make High Courts judicially strong, effective and independent

- Kamaljit Singh Garewal

IN the annals of our judiciary, the period from 1861 to 1919 was one of great changes and colonial expansion. An entirely alien legal system was foisted upon us, giving our traditional laws and panchayati system of justice a quiet burial. Vernacular schools were denied grants while English education was introduced, and schoolboys became anglicised. They would later serve in the lower ranks of the colonial administration.

A part of this policy, guided no doubt by Lord Macaulay’s famous minute, was the High Courts Act, 1861. The first three chartered High Courts were set up for the presidencies of Calcutta, Bombay and Madras under Letters Patent granted by Queen Victoria in 1862. This was followed by High Courts at Allahabad (1866), Mysore (1884), Patna (1916) and Lahore 1919 (a few weeks before the Jallianwala atrocity). The Penal Code, the Contract Act, the Evidence Act and the Codes of Civil & Criminal Procedures also come into force in the 1860s.

The Lahore High Court covered the Punjab province from Peshawar to Delhi and beyond. On the day of Independence, East Punjab High Court came up at Simla and assumed jurisdiction over present Punjab, Haryana, Delhi and large parts of present Himachal (except the princely hill states). Later, Patiala and East Punjab States Union (PEPSU) High Court got merged with it in 1956. The Court had moved to Chandigarh a year earlier. Delhi High Court, a bench of the parent Punjab High Court, separated in 1966, and surprisingly, Himachal right up to Kangra, Kulu, Lahaul and Spiti came under a bench of the Delhi High Court from 1966, till the Himachal Pradesh High Court was created in 1970.