Calcutta High Court

The Calcutta High Court is the oldest High Court in India. It is located in B.B.D. Bagh, Kolkata, West Bengal. It has jurisdiction over the state of West Bengal and the Union Territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The High Court building's design is based on the Cloth Hall, Ypres, in Belgium.[2]

Calcutta High Court
Calcutta High Court Building
Established1 July 1862 (1862-07-01)
LocationPrincipal Seat: Kolkata, West Bengal
Circuit Benches: Jalpaiguri & Port Blair (A & N Islands)
Coordinates22°34′6″N 88°20′36″E
Composition methodPresidential with confirmation of Chief Justice of India and Governor of respective state.
Authorized byConstitution of India
Appeals toSupreme Court of India
Judge term lengthTill 62 years of age
Number of positions72
{54 Permanent ; 18 Addl.}
Websitecalcuttahighcourt.gov.in
Chief Justice
CurrentlyThottathil B. Radhakrishnan[1]
Since4 April 2019

The court has a sanctioned judge strength of 72.

History
Calcutta High Court in the 1860s

The Calcutta High Court is one of the three High Courts in India established at the Presidency Towns by Letters patent granted by Queen Victoria, bearing date 26 June 1862, and is the oldest High Court in India. It was established as the High Court of Judicature at Fort William on 1 July 1862 under the High Courts Act, 1861, which was preceded by the Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William.

Calcutta High Court in the 1890s

Despite the name of the city having officially changed from Calcutta to Kolkata in 2001, the Court, as an institution retained the old name. The bill to rename it as Kolkata High Court was approved by the Union Cabinet on 5 July 2016 along with the renaming of its two other counterparts in Chennai and Mumbai.[3] The Bill called High Courts (Alternation of Names) Bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha on 19 July 2016[4] and is yet to be passed by both Houses of Parliament. Hence, the High Court still retains the old name.

Principal seat and benches

The seat of the Calcutta High Court is at Kolkata, capital of West Bengal. As per the Calcutta High Court (Extension of Jurisdiction) Act, 1953, the Calcutta High Court's jurisdiction was extended to cover Chandernagore (now called Chandannagar) and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands as of 2 May 1950. The Calcutta High Court extended its Circuit Bench in Port Blair, the capital of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and in Jalpaiguri, the divisional headquarters of the North Bengal region. On 7 February 2019, President Ram Nath Kovind finalised the opening of the other circuit bench in Jalpaiguri, West Bengal with the jurisdiction area[5] within 5 districts- Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Jalpaiguri, Alipurduar and Cooch Behar.

Chief Justice

The current Chief Justice of the court is Justice Thottathil B. Radhakrishnan.[6]

Sir Barnes Peacock was the first Chief Justice of the High Court. He assumed the charge when the court was founded on 1 July 1862. Justice Romesh Chandra Mitra was the first Indian officiating Chief Justice and Justice Phani Bhushan Chakravartti was the first Indian permanent Chief Justice of the court. The longest-serving Chief Justice was Justice Sankar Prasad Mitra.

On 20 September 1871, the acting Chief Justice, Sir John Paxton Norman, was murdered on the steps of the courthouse by a Wahabi Muslim named Abdullah.[7][8]

List of Chief Justices

For Chief Justices of the previous Supreme Court of Bengal see Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William.

# Chief Justice Term
1 Sir Barnes Peacock 1862–1870
2 Sir Richard Couch 1870–1875
3 Sir Richard Garth 1875–1886
4 Sir William Comer Petheram 1886–1896
5 Sir Francis William Maclean 1896–1909
6 Sir Lawrence Hugh Jenkins 1909–1915
7 Sir Lancelot Sanderson 1915–1926
8 Sir George Claus Rankin 1926–1934
9 Sir Harold Derbyshire 1934–1946
10 Sir Arthur Trevor Harries 1946–1952
After Indian Independence
1 Shri Phani Bhusan Chakravartti 1952–1958
2 Shri Kulada Charan Das Gupta 1958–1959
3 Shri Surajit Chandra Lahiri 1959–1961
4 Shri Himansu Kumar Bose 1961–1966
5 Deep Narayan Sinha 1966–1970
6 Shri Prasanta Bihari Mukharji 1970–1972
7 Shri Sankar Prasad Mitra 1972–1979
8 Shri Amarendra Nath Sen 1979–1981
9 Shri Sambhu Chandra Ghose 1981–1983
10 Shri Samarendra Chandra Deb January 1983 – February 1983
11 Shri Satish Chandra 1983–1986
12 Shri Anil Kumar Sen September 1986 – October 1986
13 Shri Chittatosh Mookerjee 1 November 1986 – 1 November 1987
14 Shri Debi Singh Tewatia 1 November 1987 – 1988
15 Shri Prabodh Dinkarrao Desai 1988–1991
16 Shri Nagendra Prasad Singh 4 February 1992 – 14 June 1992
17 Shri Anandamoy Bhattacharjee 1992–1994
18 Shri Krishna Chandra Agarwal 1994–1996
19 V. N. Khare 2 February 1996 – 20 March 1997
20 Shri Prabha Shankar Mishra 1997–1998
21 Shri Ashok Kumar Mathur 22 December 1999 – 6 June 2004
22 Shri V. S. Sirpurkar 20 March 2005 – 11 January 2007
23 Shri Surinder Singh Nijjar 8 March 2007 – 16 November 2009
24 Shri Mohit Shantilal Shah 24 December 2009 – 25 June 2010
25 Shri Jai Narayan Patel 2010 – 4 October 2012
- Shri Kalyan Jyoti Sengupta (acting) 5 October 2012 – 30 October 2012
26 Shri Arun Kumar Mishra 14 December 2012 – 6 July 2014
27 Shri Manjula Chellur 5 August 2014 – 21 August 2016
- Shri Girish Chandra Gupta (acting) 22 August 2016 – 20 September 2016
28 Shri Girish Chandra Gupta 21 September 2016 – 30 November 2016
- Shri Nishita Nirmal Mhatre (acting) 1 December 2016 – 20 September 2017
- Shri Rakesh Tiwari (acting) 20 September 2017 – 24 October 2017
- Shri Jyotirmay Bhattacharya (acting) 25 October 2017 – 30 April 2018
29 Jyotirmay Bhattacharya 1 May 2018 – 24 September 2018
- Shri Debasish Kar Gupta (acting) 25 September 2018 – 29 October 2018
30 Shri Debasish Kar Gupta 30 October 2018 – 31 December 2018
- Shri Biswanath Somadder (acting) 1 January 2019 — 3 April 2019
31 Shri Thottathil B. Radhakrishnan 4 April 2019 — Present

Judges

The court has a Sanctioned strength of 72 (Permanent:54, Additional:18) judges.

Judges elevated to the Supreme Court of India-

Sr. No Name of the Judge, Justice Date of Elevation Date of Retirement Parent High Court
1 Indira Banerjee 7 August 2018 23 September 2022 Calcutta
2 Aniruddha Bose 24 May 2019 10 April 2024 Calcutta

Judges transferred from the Calcutta High Court-

Sr. No. Name of the Judge, Justice Recruitment Date of Appointment Date of Retirement Remark
1 Biswanath Somadder BAR 22 June 2006 14 December 2025 Chief Justice of Meghalaya High Court
2 Sudip Ahluwalia SERVICE 1 October 2013 30 December 2021 Judge of Punjab and Haryana High Court

Sitting Judges of Calcutta High Court-

See also: List of sitting judges of High Courts of India § Calcutta High Court

Building

The neo-Gothic High Court building was constructed in 1872, ten years after the establishment of the court itself. The design, by then government architect Walter Granville, was loosely modelled on the 13th-century Cloth Hall at Ypres, Belgium.[9] In 1977 another building named High Court Centenary Building or annexed building was inaugurated to reduce the pressure.[10]

  • Calcutta High Court - Centenary Building
  • Calcutta High Court - New Multi-storey Building
  • Calcutta High Court at Night
  • Inside View of Calcutta High Court
  • Calcutta High Court - Sculptured Pillar

References
  1. http://www.calcuttahighcourt.gov.in/Judges/CJ-and-Judges
  2. "Court's official website". Archived from the original on 6 March 2007. Retrieved 7 April 2007.
  3. Change of name of Madras, Bombay and Calcutta HC
  4. PTI. "Govt. moves Bill to change names of High Courts". thehindu.com. Archived from the original on 5 November 2016. Retrieved 9 May 2017.
  5. "Orders/notification of establishment of a bench of Calcutta High Court at Jalpaiguri (English/ Hindi) (07.02.2019)" (PDF). Retrieved 12 February 2019.
  6. "Chief Justices appointed to Five High Courts [Read Notifications] - Bar & Bench". Bar & Bench. 24 October 2018. Retrieved 25 October 2018.
  7. Ivermee, Robert. Secularism, Islam and Education in India, 1830–1910.
  8. James, Halen. "The Assassination of Lord Mayo : The "First" Jihad?" (PDF). IJAPS,Vol 5, No.2 (July 2009). Retrieved 18 November 2012.
  9. "Court's official website". Archived from the original on 6 March 2007. Retrieved 7 April 2007.
  10. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND. "CITY SESSIONS COURT, CALCUTTA". calcuttahighcourt.nic.in. Archived from the original on 9 February 2012. Retrieved 3 March 2017.
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