1) Out of 25 High Courts in the country only one state HC has a woman Chief Justice (CJ Hima Kohli at Telangana High Court). Only 73 out of 661 High Court judges, which is roughly 11.04% are women.
2) In five High Courts, namely, Manipur, Meghalaya, Patna, Tripura and Uttarakhand, there is not even a single woman judge.
Advantages of increasing women presence in judiciary:
1. Women judges contribute far more to justice than improving its appearance: they also contribute significantly to the quality of decision-making, and thus to the quality of justice itself.
Women judges bring those lived experiences to their judicial actions, experiences that tend toward a more comprehensive and empathetic perspective- one that encompasses not only the legal basis for judicial action, but also awareness of consequences on the people affected.
Suggestions to increase women’s participation in the higher judiciary:
1. Making the process of Judicial appointment more transparent, inclusive and involve representation from government and opposition rather than the current scenario of ‘judges appointing judges’ (Collegium system).
2. Adopt better practices from countries like Britain where the government created an Advisory Panel on Judicial Diversity to investigate the barriers to women and in the judiciary and propose suitable remedies and recommendations.
3. Lack of infrastructure in courts, genders stereotypes and societal attitudes that have created hurdles for women to enter the legal profession. For example – a survey noted that out of nearly 6,000 trial courts, 22% have no toilets for women. This needs to change.
4. A parliamentary standing committee on law and justice has proposed reservation for women in the higher judiciary. The standing committee, in its report in 2015, recommended that women should have equal representation in the higher judiciary, and to ensure that reservation could be considered.
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