# Delhi High Court

The High Court of Delhi (Hindustani: दिल्ली उच्च न्यायालय; dillī uchcha nyāyālaya) is the high court in Delhi, India. It was established on 31 October 1966, through the Delhi High Court Act, 1966. Below it are 11 Subordinate Courts that oversee smaller judicial districts. The court gets its powers from Chapter V in Part VI of the Constitution of India.

## History

Established in 1919, the High Court of Judicature at Lahore exercised jurisdiction over the then provinces of Punjab and Delhi. This continued until the Indian Independence Act 1947, establishing the dominions of India and Pakistan.
On 15 August 1947 the High Courts (Punjab) Order, 1947 established a new High Court for the territory of what was then East Punjab. The India (Adaptation of Existing Indian Laws) Order, 1947 provided that any reference in an existing Indian law to the High Court of Judicature at Lahore, be replaced by a reference to the High Court of East Punjab.
The High Court of East Punjab started functioning from Shimla in a building called "Peterhoff". This building burnt down in January 1981.
When the Secretariat of the Punjab Government shifted to Chandigarh in 1954-55, the High Court also shifted to Chandigarh. The High Court of Punjab, as it is later came to be called, exercised jurisdiction over Delhi through a Circuit Bench which dealt with the cases pertaining to the Union Territory of Delhi and the Delhi Administration.
In view of the importance of Delhi, its population and other considerations, Indian Parliament thought it was necessary to establish a new High Court of Delhi. This was achieved by enacting the Delhi High Court Act, 1966 on 5 September 1966.
The High Court of Delhi initially exercised jurisdiction not only over the Union Territory of Delhi, but also Himachal Pradesh. The High Court of Delhi had a Himachal Pradesh Bench at Shimla in a building called Ravenswood. The High Court of Delhi continued to exercise jurisdiction over Himachal Pradesh until the State of Himachal Pradesh Act, 1970 was enforced on 25 January 1971.

## Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court

The Chief Justice of the High Court of Delhi is appointed by the President of India, in consultation with the Chief Justice of India. During the appointment, the Chief Justice of India is required to consult with two senior-most judges of the Supreme Court. For all other High Courts in India, The Chief Justices are appointed by the President of India, as provided under Article 217 of the Constitution, in consultation with the Chief Justice of India and the Governor of the State. The Chief Justice is the senior-most sitting judge of the High Court in a State. Besides performing judicial functions, he/she also exercises administrative powers, as provided under Article 229 of the Constitution of India.
Current Chief Justice of this court is Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya. He was appointed on 21 January 2025.

## Judges of the Delhi High Court

The Judges of High Court of Delhi (other than the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court) are appointed by the President by warrant under his hand and seal after consultation with the Chief Justice of India, and on the recommendation of the Chief Justice of the High Court of Delhi. The Chief Justice of India is required to consult with two senior-most judges of the Supreme Court. The Chief Justice of the High Court is also required to consult his two senior-most puisne Judges before recommending a name for appointment to the High Court. The Judges of the Delhi High Court are guided by the code of ethics as stated in ‘Restatement of Values of Judicial Life’ adopted by the Supreme Court of India, vide its resolution dated 7 May 1997.
Currently, the sanctioned strength of Judges of the High Court of Delhi is 45 permanent Judges and 15 Additional Judges. Following is the list of sitting Judges of the High Court of Delhi:

### Permanent judges

| # | Judge | Date of joining | Date of retirement |
| 1 | Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya (CJ) | 21 January 2025 | 15 June 2027 |
| 2 | Vibhu Bakhru | 17 April 2013 | 1 November 2028 |
| 3 | Yashwant Varma | 13 October 2014 | 5 January 2031 |
| 4 | Rekha Palli | 15 May 2017 | 8 March 2025 |
| 5 | Prathiba M. Singh | 15 May 2017 | 19 July 2030 |
| 6 | Navin Chawla | 15 May 2017 | 6 August 2031 |
| 7 | C. Hari Shankar | 15 May 2017 | 3 May 2030 |
| 8 | Chandra Dhari Singh | 22 September 2017 | 11 July 2031 |
| 9 | Subramonium Prasad | 4 June 2018 | 21 June 2029 |
| 10 | Jyoti Singh | 22 October 2018 | 30 September 2028 |
| 11 | Prateek Jalan | 22 October 2018 | 3 April 2032 |
| 12 | Anup Jairam Bhambhani | 22 October 2018 | 4 December 2027 |
| 13 | Sanjeev Narula | 22 October 2018 | 23 August 2032 |
| 14 | Manoj Kumar Ohri | 20 November 2018 | 11 November 2031 |
| 15 | Jasmeet Singh | 24 February 2021 | 25 February 2030 |
| 16 | Amit Bansal | 24 February 2021 | 7 February 2031 |
| 17 | Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav | 8 October 2021 | 3 October 2038 |
| 18 | Neena Bansal Krishna | 28 February 2022 | 17 June 2027 |
| 19 | Dinesh Kumar Sharma | 28 February 2022 | 20 September 2027 |
| 20 | Anoop Kumar Mendiratta | 28 February 2022 | 5 March 2025 |
| 21 | Swarana Kanta Sharma | 28 March 2022 | 4 August 2030 |
| 22 | Tara Vitasta Ganju | 18 May 2022 | 11 August 2033 |
| 23 | Mini Pushkarna | 18 May 2022 | 30 November 2033 |
| 24 | Vikas Mahajan | 18 May 2022 | 7 August 2031 |
| 25 | Tushar Rao Gedela | 18 May 2022 | 17 July 2029 |
| 26 | Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora | 18 May 2022 | 13 February 2036 |
| 27 | Sachin Datta | 18 May 2022 | 14 August 2035 |
| 28 | Amit Mahajan | 18 May 2022 | 19 April 2036 |
| 29 | Saurabh Banerjee | 18 May 2022 | 19 January 2038 |
| 30 | Anish Dayal | 2 June 2022 | 14 March 2035 |
| 31 | Amit Sharma | 2 June 2022 | 6 July 2034 |
| 32 | Girish Kathpalia | 1 May 2023 | 31 December 2026 |
| 33 | Manoj Jain | 1 May 2023 | 27 December 2026 |
| 34 | Dharmesh Sharma | 17 May 2023 | 8 June 2025 |
| | Vacant | | |

### Additional judges

| # | Judge | Date of joining |
| 1 | Shalinder Kaur | 20 October 2023 |
| 2 | Ravinder Dudeja | 20 October 2023 |
| | Vacant | |

## Original Side Civil Jurisdiction

The High Court of Delhi is territory. This means that civil cases can be filed directly in the High Court, whereas the High Court generally only has appellate civil jurisdiction otherwise. The other High Courts which have original side jurisdiction are Bombay, Calcutta and Madras.

## Backlog

As per the report released on 2006–08, Delhi High court has a long list of pending cases. The backlog is such that it would take 466 years to resolve them. In a bid to restore public trust and confidence, Delhi court spent 5 minutes per case and disposed of 94,000 cases in 2008–10.

## Former Chief Justices

| # | Chief Justices | Tenure | Tenure |
| # | Chief Justices | Start | End |
| 1 | K. S. Hegde | 31 Oct 1966 | 16 Jul 1967 |
| - | M K M Ismail (acting) | 17 Jul 1967 | 13 Nov 1967 |
| 2 | I. D. Dua | 14 Nov 1967 | 01 Aug 1969 |
| 3 | H. R. Khanna | 01 Aug 1969 | 22 Sep 1970 |
| 4 | Hardayal Hardy | 22 Sep 1971 | 15 May 1972 |
| 5 | Narain Andley | 15 May 1972 | 04 Jun 1974 |
| 6 | T. V. R. Tatachari | 04 Jun 1974 | 16 Oct 1978 |
| 7 | V. S. Deshpande | 16 Oct 1978 | 27 Mar 1980 |
| 8 | Prakash Narain | 08 Jan 1981 | 06 Aug 1985 |
| 9 | Rajinder Sachar | 06 Aug 1985 | 22 Dec 1985 |
| 10 | D. K. Kapur | 22 Dec 1985 | 20 Aug 1986 |
| 11 | T.P.S. Chawla | 20 Aug 1986 | 16 Aug 1987 |
| - | R. N. Aggarwal (acting) | 16 Aug 1987 | 21 Aug 1987 |
| 12 | Yogeshwar Dayal | 21 Aug 1987 | 18 Mar 1988 |
| 13 | Rabindranath Pyne | 18 Mar 1988 | 28 Sep 1990 |
| 14 | Milap Chand Jain | 28 Nov 1990 | 21 Jul 1991 |
| 15 | G. C. Mittal | 05 Aug 1991 | 04 Mar 1994 |
| 16 | M. Jagannadha Rao | 12 Apr 1994 | 21 Mar 1997 |
| 17 | Mahinder Narain | 21 Mar 1997 | 30 Dec 1999 |
| 18 | Sam Nariman Variava | 31 Dec 1999 | 15 Mar 2000 |
| 19 | Arijit Pasayat | 10 May 2000 | 19 Oct 2001 |
| 20 | S.B. Sinha | 26 Nov 2001 | 01 Oct 2002 |
| 21 | B. C. Patel | 05 Mar 2003 | 07 Aug 2005 |
| 22 | Markandey Katju | 12 Oct 2005 | 10 Apr 2006 |
| 23 | Mukundakam Sharma | 04 Dec 2006 | 09 Apr 2008 |
| 24 | Ajit Prakash Shah | 11 May 2008 | 12 Feb 2010 |
| 25 | Dipak Misra | 24 May 2010 | 10 Oct 2011 |
| 26 | D Murugesan | 26 Sep 2012 | 10 Jun 2013 |
| - | Badar Durrez Ahmed (acting) | 10 Jun 2013 | 01 Sept 2013 |
| 27 | N. V. Ramana | 02 Sep 2013 | 16 Feb 2014 |
| - | Badar Durrez Ahmed (acting) | 17 Feb 2014 | 20 Apr 2014 |
| 28 | Gorla Rohini | 21 Apr 2014 | 13 Apr 2017 |
| - | Gita Mittal (acting) | 14 Apr 2017 | 10 Aug 2018 |
| 29 | Rajendra Menon | 11 Aug 2018 | 06 Jun 2019 |
| 30 | Dhirubhai Naranbhai Patel | 07 Jun 2019 | 12 Mar 2022 |
| - | Vipin Sanghi (acting) | 13 Mar 2022 | 27 Jun 2022 |
| 31 | Satish Chandra Sharma | 28 Jun 2022 | 08 Nov 2023 |
| - | Manmohan (acting) | 09 Nov 2023 | 28 Sep 2024 |
| 32 | Manmohan | 29 Sep 2024 | 04 Dec 2024 |
| - | Vibhu Bakhru (acting) | 05 Dec 2024 | 20 January 2025 |

## District Courts

The National Capital Territory of Delhi has 7 District Courts Complex that function under the High Court of Delhi. These 7 are physical locations of the district courts, whereas actually there are 11 district courts headed by individual District Judges. The Tis Hazari complex, Rohini complex and Saket complex hosts 2 Districts each, while the Karkardooma complex hosts 3 Districts and the remaining 3 complexes (Patiala, Dwarka and Rouse Avenue) host 1 District each.
The list of 7 District Courts Complex in Delhi is as follows:
| S.No. | Year of establishment | Districts | Name of Court |
| 1 | 1958 | Central Delhi and West Delhi | Tis Hazari Courts Complex |
| 2 | 1977 | New Delhi | Patiala House Courts Complex |
| 3 | 1993 | East Delhi, North-East Delhi and Shahdara | Karkardooma Courts Complex |
| 4 | 2005 | North Delhi and North-West Delhi | Rohini Courts Complex |
| 5 | 2008 | South-West Delhi | Dwarka Courts Complex |
| 6 | 2010 | South Delhi and South-East Delhi | Saket Courts Complex |
| 7 | 2019 | Central Delhi and CBI Courts or labour Court. | Rouse Avenue Courts Complex |

## Notable cases

Notable cases decided or involving the High Court include:
* Asian News International v. Wikimedia Foundation
* Naz Foundation v. Govt. of NCT of Delhi
* University of Oxford v. Rameshwari Photocopy Service
* Suresh Kumar Koushal v. Naz Foundation
* Amar Nath Sehgal v. Union of India
* National Legal Services Authority v. Union of India
* Penguin Books Ltd. v. India Book Distributors and Others