# Calcutta High Court

The Calcutta High Court is the oldest High Court in India. It is located at Esplanade Row West, 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 somewhat based on the Lakenhal (Cloth Hall) in Ypres in Flanders, Belgium.
Currently, the court has a sanctioned judge strength of 72.

## History

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, and is the oldest High Court in India. It was brought into existence as the High Court of Judicature at Fort William by the Letters Patent dated 14 May 1862, issued under the High Courts Act, 1861, which was preceded by the Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William. The court was formally opened on 1 July 1862. The building structure was designed by Walter Long Bozzi Granville.
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. The Bill called High Courts (Alteration of Names) Bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha on 19 July 2016 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 within 5 districts- Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Jalpaiguri, Alipurduar and Cooch Behar.

## Chief Justice

The current Chief Justice of the court is Justice T. S. Sivagnanam. 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.

## List of chief justices

For chief justices of the previous Supreme Court of Bengal see Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William.

### The court's first judges were

* 1 Sir Elijah Impey, Chief justice from 1774 to 1783 on his recall to England for impeachment.
* 2 Stephen Caesar Le Maistre, Puisne judge from 1774 to 1777 on his death.
* 3 John Hyde (judge), Puisne judge from 1774 to 1796 on his death.
* 4 Robert Chambers, Puisne judge from 1774 to 1783, Acting Chief Justice from 1783 to 1791. Chief Justice from 1791-1798, on his resignation.
* 5 Sir William Jones, Puisne judge from 1783 to 1794 on his death.
* 6 Sir William Dunkin, Puisne judge from August 14, 1791 to unknown.
| | Chief Justice | Term | Notes |
| 7 | Sir Elijah Impey | 16 March 1774–1791 | Recalled 1783 |
| 8 | Sir Robert Chambers | 1791–1 Aug 1798 | previously Acting Chief Justice 1783–1791 |
| 9 | Sir John Anstruther, Bt | 1798–22 Feb 1806 | |
| 10 | Sir Henry Russell | 1807–9 Nov 1813 | |
| 11 | Sir Edward Hyde East | 1813–July 1822 | |
| 12 | Sir Robert Henry Blosset | 1822–1 Feb 1823 | (died in office) |
| 13 | Sir Christopher Puller | 1823–26 May 1824 | (died in office) |
| 14 | Sir Charles Grey | 1825–1832 | |
| 15 | Sir William O. Russell | 22 Feb 1832–1833 | (died in office) |
| 16 | Sir Edward Ryan | 1833–1842 | |
| 17 | Sir Lawrence Peel | 1842–1855 | |
| 18 | Sir James William Colvile | 1855–1859 | |
| 19 | Sir Barnes Peacock | 1859–1862 | afterwards Chief Justice of the High Court of Calcutta |

### Justices

| Justices | Term | Notes |
| Stephen Caesar Le Maistre | 22 October 1774–4 Nov 1777 | Died |
| John Hyde | 22 October 1774–8 July 1796 | Died |
| William Jones | 22 Oct 1783–27 Apr 1791 | Died |
| William Dunkin | 3 Sept 1791–1 Aug 1797 | Resigned |
| James Watson | 1 Mar 1796–2 May 1796 | Died |
| John Royds | 23 Oct 1797–26 Sept 1816 | Died |
| William Burroughs | 3 Nov 1806–20 Dec 1815 | Resigned |
| Francis Maonaghten | 1 Mar 1816–2 Mar 1825 | Resigned |
| Anthony Buller | 26 Sept 1816–1 Jan 1827 | Resigned |
| John Franks | 6 Oct 1825–15 Mar 1831 | Resigned |
| John Peter Grant | 17 Oct 1833–1848 | |
| Benjamin Heath Malkin | 6 Oct 1835–21 Oct 1837 | Died |

## List

| # | Chief Justice | Term |
| — | Romesh Chandra Mitra | 1861 —1861 |
| 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 |||
| 11 | Shri Phani Bhusan Chakravartti | 1952–1958 |
| 12 | Shri Kulada Charan Das Gupta | 1958–1959 |
| 13 | Shri Surajit Chandra Lahiri | 1959–1961 |
| 14 | Shri Himansu Kumar Bose | 1961–1966 |
| 15 | Shri Deep Narayan Sinha | 1966–1970 |
| 16 | Shri Prasanta Bihari Mukharji | 1970–1972 |
| 17 | Shri Sankar Prasad Mitra | 1972–1979 |
| 18 | Shri Amarendra Nath Sen | 1979–1981 |
| 19 | Shri Sambhu Chandra Ghose | 1981–1983 |
| 20 | Shri Samarendra Chandra Deb | January 1983 – February 1983 |
| 21 | Shri Satish Chandra | 1983–1986 |
| 22 | Shri Anil Kumar Sen | September 1986 – October 1986 |
| 23 | Shri Chittatosh Mookerjee | 1 November 1986 – 1 November 1987 |
| 24 | Shri Debi Singh Tewatia | 1 November 1987 – 1988 |
| 25 | Shri Prabodh Dinkarrao Desai | 1988–1991 |
| 26 | Shri Nagendra Prasad Singh | 4 February 1992 – 14 June 1992 |
| 27 | Shri Anandamoy Bhattacharjee | 1992–1994 |
| 28 | Shri Krishna Chandra Agarwal | 1994–1996 |
| 29 | Shri V. N. Khare | 2 February 1996 – 20 March 1997 |
| 30 | Shri Prabha Shankar Mishra | 1997–1998 |
| 31 | Shri Ashok Kumar Mathur | 22 December 1999 – 6 June 2004 |
| 32 | Shri V. S. Sirpurkar | 20 March 2005 – 11 January 2007 |
| 33 | Shri Surinder Singh Nijjar | 8 March 2007 – 16 November 2009 |
| 34 | Shri Mohit Shantilal Shah | 24 December 2009 – 25 June 2010 |
| 35 | Shri Jai Narayan Patel | 2010 – 4 October 2012 |
| 36 | Shri Arun Kumar Mishra | 14 December 2012 – 6 July 2014 |
| 37 | Smt. Manjula Chellur | 5 August 2014 – 21 August 2016 |
| 38 | Shri Girish Chandra Gupta | 21 September 2016 – 30 November 2016 |
| 39 | Shri Jyotirmay Bhattacharya | 1 May 2018 – 24 September 2018 |
| 40 | Shri Debasish Kar Gupta | 30 October 2018 – 31 December 2018 |
| 41 | Shri Thottathil B. Radhakrishnan | 4 April 2019 — 28 April 2021 |
| 42 | Shri Prakash Shrivastava | 11 October 2021 — 30 March 2023 |
| 43 | Shri T. S. Sivagnanam | 11 May 2023 — Incumbent |

## 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 | Aniruddha Bose | 24 May 2019 | 10 April 2024 | Calcutta |
| 2 | Dipankar Datta | 12 December 2022 | 8 February 2030 | Calcutta |
Judges Transferred/Elevated 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 Sikkim High Court |
| 2 | Sanjib Banerjee | BAR | 22 June 2006 | 1 November 2023 | Chief Justice of Meghalaya High Court |
Sitting Judges of 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. In 1977 another building named High Court Centenary Building or annexed building was inaugurated to reduce the pressure.

## Connectivity
### Rails

Eden Gardens railway station is the nearest railway station, which is 650 meters away from the court. Esplanade metro station, the nearest rapid rail transit is 1.3 km away.