Judges must retire to enable successors rejig old legal principles: CJI

Judges must retire so the succeeding generations point out errors of the past and rejig legal principles for society to evolve, Chief Justice DY Chandrachud said on Saturday.

Sharing his perspective on the retirement age of judges at the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit here, Chandrachud said while the American constitution has no age of retirement for judges, in India, judges retire after a particular age.

The CJI said it would be "too much of a responsibility" cast on human beings in terms of their own infallibility by postulating that they should not retire from office.

"We have followed a model where judges retire. But as someone who has been in the system for 23 years as a judge, I have a different take. In a sense, it is important that judges must retire because its too much of a responsibility to cast on a human being in terms of their own infallibility by postulating that they should not retire from their office.

"Judges are human beings prone to errors and societies evolve. You must pass on the mantle to succeeding generations who would be able to point out errors of the past and rejig legal principles for society to evolve. Because to give that sort of power to unelected judges to continue for life, in the Indian context, it is wisely not adopted by the Indian Constitution. So as to allow for a source of change for the transformation of legal principles," he said.

Currently, the retirement age for judges in India is 60 years in lower courts, 62 in high courts and 65 in the Supreme Court.

A parliamentary committee had recommended a performance appraisal system for extending the tenure of judges of the Supreme Court and high courts beyond the existing retirement age.

During the tenure of the UPA-II government, a bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha to bring the retirement age of HC judges on par with those of the apex court but it never came up for consideration and lapsed.