More SC judges welcome, but wider reforms needed: Legal experts 

The Lok Sabha on Tuesday passed the Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Amendment Bill, 2026, which seeks to increase the number of judges, excluding the Chief Justice of India, from 33 to 37. This will raise the Court’s total sanctioned strength from 34 to 38.

Explaining the Bill’s objectives, Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal described the increase as “one of the most exigent and viable solutions” for tackling the backlog. It would also enable the Chief Justice of India to constitute Constitution Benches more regularly to hear cases involving substantial questions of law, he said.

Gopal Jain, senior advocate at the Supreme Court, said the time was right for an “all-out attack” on pendency. “The amendment gives a fillip to the cause of justice. It will also add to the Court’s strength, efficiency and expertise across different subject matters,” he said.

Pallavi Shroff, managing partner at Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas, described the measure as welcome but cautioned that “merely increasing the number of judges will not solve the problem of pendency”. More comprehensive reforms were needed, she said.

Karam Daulet Singh, managing partner at Touchstone Partners, agreed. “While much remains to be done in terms of judicial reforms and the overall approach of the judiciary, the amendment is a progressive and welcome move,” he said. It could have some impact on the Supreme Court’s pendency and potentially produce a cascading effect across other courts, he added.

Indranil D Deshmukh, partner and head of disputes at Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas, said more judges were an essential part of judicial reform, but only one part. “The real bottlenecks lie below,” he said, pointing to the High Courts, district judiciary and tribunals, where vacancies, inadequate infrastructure and procedural delays compound one another.

A meaningful reduction in pendency would require investment in infrastructure, procedural and appellate reform, and faster and more transparent appointments to the trial courts, High Courts and tribunals, Deshmukh said.

Sajan Poovayya, senior advocate at the Supreme Court, described the amendment as “necessary but not sufficient”. Increasing the number of judges could improve disposal capacity at the margins, but was unlikely to produce a transformative reduction in pendency without deeper institutional reform, he said.

“The real solution lies in strengthening the High Courts so that fewer matters travel to the Supreme Court, rationalising the Court’s jurisdiction, adopting better case-management practices and leveraging technology to improve judicial efficiency,” Poovayya said.

Senior advocate Saurabh Kirpal identified judicial uncertainty as another reason for the accumulation of cases. A lack of predictability encourages litigants to pursue appeals of doubtful merit in the hope that the Court may entertain them, he said.

“Increasing the number of judges alone will not resolve this problem,” Kirpal said. “A better course would be for the Court to be more selective in choosing the cases it hears and to maintain greater judicial discipline and consistency.”

Former chief justice of the Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh High Court, Justice Ali Mohammed Magrey, said increasing the sanctioned strength would help reduce pendency, but argued that the reform should be accompanied by more effective use of judicial working time. He called for a longer working week and greater use of virtual technology for conferences and other non-judicial engagements.

The pressure on the Supreme Court’s docket has continued to rise because the institution of fresh cases has persistently outpaced final disposal. As of January 1, 2026, 92,101 cases were pending before the Court.

Despite operating close to its sanctioned strength of 34 judges, the Supreme Court received 75,410 fresh matters in 2025 while disposing of 65,615. The continuing gap highlights the challenge of reducing older arrears while also finding sufficient judicial time for cases that require adjudication by larger Benches.