Kerala High Court

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High Court of Kerala is the highest court in the Indian state of Kerala and in the Union Territory of Lakshadweep. The High Court of Kerala is headquartered at Kochi. Drawing its powers from the Constitution of India, the High Court has the power to issue directions, orders and writs including the writs of habeas corpus, mandamus, prohibition, quo warranto and certiorari for ensuring the enforcement of the Fundamental Rights guaranteed by the Constitution to citizens or for other specified purposes. The High Court is empowered with original, appellate and revisional jurisdiction in civil as well as criminal matters, and the power to answer references to it under some statutes. The High Court has the superintendence and visitorial jurisdiction over all courts and tribunals of inferior jurisdiction covered under its territorial jurisdiction.

The Chief Justice of the High Court of Kerala is Justice H.L Dattu ^[1]. The High Court of Kerala has a sanctioned judge strength of 40^[2]out of which 26 judges are functioning at present. Depending on the importance and nature of the question to be adjudicated, the judges sit as Single (one judge), Division (two judges), Full (three judges) or such other benches of larger strengths.

The foundation stone for the new multi-storied building of High Court for housing the High Court of Kerala was laid on 14 March 1994 by the then Chief Justice of India, Justice M. N. Venkatachaliah. The estimated cost of construction was ten crore Indian rupees ^[3]. The construction was completed in the year 2005 at a cost of eighty-five crore^[clarify] Indian rupees. The completed High Court building was inaugurated by the Chief Justice of India, Justice Y.K.Sabharwal on 11th February, 2006. The new High Court building is equipped with modern amenities like videoconferencing, air conditioned Court rooms, intranet working, facilities for retrieval of order copies and case status via internet etc. The building is built on five acres of land and has a super built-up area of 550,000 square feet on total nine floors. The building has in it a post office, bank, medical clinic, library, canteens and such other most needed utilities and services. The High Court of Kerala has moved to its new building from the date of its inauguration, from the adjacent Ram Mohan Palace, where it had been functioning.

Contents 1 History of Judicial System in the State of Kerala 1.1 Judicial System in the Kingdom of Travancore 1.2 Judicial System in the Kingdom of Cochin 1.3 After the integration of Travancore and Cochin Kingdoms 1.4 Establishment of High Court of Kerala 2 Judges 2.1 Past Chief Justices 3 Controversy 4 See also 5 Citations 6 See also

[edit] History of Judicial System in the State of Kerala

The present State of Kerala is result of integrating the erstwhile princely Kingdoms of Travancore and Cochin with Malabar district and Kasaragod. The present judicial system in Kerala has its roots dating back to the days of the monarchs of the Kingdoms of Travancore and Cochin. Colonel Munro, who functioned as the British Resident cum political agent in the Kingdom of Cochin and as the Diwan in the Kingdom of Travancore is the key person who laid the foundations for a systematic legal system, which resulted in the present day scenario. Until his time, there were no independent tribunals for the administration of justice.

[edit] Judicial System in the Kingdom of Travancore

In the Kingdom of Travancore, Colonel Munro recommended necessary regulations to be passed for the reorganisation of the Courts. These recommendations were accepted by the then Thiruvithaamcoore monarch and a Regulation in tune to his recommendations was passed in the year 1811. Zilla Courts and a Huzur Court were established in the Kingdom of Travancore, in the years 1811 and 1814 respectively. Huzur Court, which functioned as the final appellate Court was later replaced by Sadar Court in the year 1861. Sadar Court, which possessed almost all the powers of the present High Court of Kerala, continued functioning until 1881. Later in the year 1887, the High Court of Travancore was established with bench strength of five judges. One among the five judges was appointed as the Chief Justice. The judges had the assistance of a Pundit, who acted alike an amicus curiae to advice them on the various points of Hindu law. Mr. Ramachandra Iyer was appointed as the first Chief Justice, at his prime age of 35.

[edit] Judicial System in the Kingdom of Cochin

In the Kingdom of Cochin, Desavazhis and Naduvazhis were empowered to settle the disputes following the prevailing customary law. More serious matters used to be attended by the monarch himself. In the year 1812, for the first time in its history, graded law courts were established under the Diwanship of Colonel Munro, in the Kingdom of Cochin. The first Subordinate Courts (Sub Courts) were established by Colonel Munro at Trichur (Thrissur) and Tripunithura. Until 1835, Huzur Court was the final appellate Court. Huzur Court had bench strength of three judges. Later Huzur Court was reconstituted as Raja's Court of Appeal and Subordinate Courts were reconstituted as Zilla Courts. The Zilla courts were empowered with unlimited jurisdiction, but subject to the confirmation from the Raja's Court of Appeal. The Raja's Court of Appeal was reconstituted as the Chief Court of Cochin in the year 1900. The Chief Court of Cochin had three permanent judges one of whom acted as the Chief Judge. Mr. S. Locke was appointed as the first Chief Judge. Later the Chief Court of Cochin was reconstituted as the High Court, during the Diwanship of Sri. Shanmukham Chettiyar.

[edit] After the integration of Travancore and Cochin Kingdoms

After India gained her independence on 15 August 1947, Kingdoms of Travancore and Cochin were integrated to form the Travancore-Cochin State or Thiru-Kochi on 1 July 1949. Later, the High Court of Travancore-Cochin was established at Ernakulam, on the 7 July 1949 under the Travancore-Cochin High Court Act, 1949. Mr. Puthupally Krishna Pillai acted the last Chief Justice of High Court of Travancore-Cochin.

[edit] Establishment of High Court of Kerala

On 1st November 1956, the States Reorganisation Act, 1956 was passed thereby integrating the State of Travancore-Cochin with Malabar district and Kasaragod to form the present State of Kerala. The High Court of Kerala, as it is today was established on 1 November 1956 as the High Court designated for the State of Kerala. The Kerala High Court Act, 1958 defined the jurisdiction and various functions, and powers of the High Court of Kerala. Initially, many cases from both the Travancore-Cochin High Court and the High Court of Madras were transferred to the High Court of Kerala for adjudication. Justice K. T. Koshi was appointed as the first Chief Justice of High Court of Kerala.

[edit] Judges

Sl No	Name of the Justice	Status	Date of Retirement
1	H. L. Dattu	Chief Justice
2	K.Padmanabhan Nair [4]	Permanent Judge	20 May 2008
3	J.B.Koshy [5]	Permanent Judge	13 May 2009
4	K.P.Balchandran [6]	Permanent Judge	1 June 2009
5	K.Balakrishnan Nair [7]	Permanent Judge	12 April 2010
6	P.R.Raman [8]	Permanent Judge	14 May 2010
7	M.N.Krishnan [9]	Permanent Judge	10 February 2011
8	K.S.Radhakrinanan [10]	Permanent Judge	15 May 2011
9	A.K.Basheer [11]	Permanent Judge	1 July 2011
10	R.Basant [12]	Permanent Judge	5 May 2012
11	V.Ramkumar [13]	Permanent Judge	7 May 2012
12	C.N.Ramachandran Nair [14]	Permanent Judge	1 October 2012
13	M.Sasidhraran Nambiar [15]	Permanent Judge	3 January 2013
14	K.Hema [16]	Permanent Judge	23 March 2013
15	Pius C. Kuriakose [17]	Permanent Judge	2 October 2013
16	S.Siri Jagan [18]	Permanent Judge	22 January 2014
17	Kurian Joseph [19]	Permanent Judge	30 November 2015
18	K.T.Sankaran [20]	Permanent Judge	25 December 2016
19	K.M.Joseph [21]	Permanent Judge	19 June 2020
20	Thottathil B. Radhakrishnan [22]	Permanent Judge	29 April 2021
21	T.R.Ramachandran Nair [23]	Permanent Judge
22	Antony Dominic [24]	Additional Judge
23	Harun Al Rashid [25]	Additional Judge
24	V.K. Mohanan [26]	Additional Judge
25	V.Giri [27]	Additional Judge
26	P.N.Raveendran	Additional Judge

[edit] Past Chief Justices

Sl No	Name of the judge
1	K. T. Koshi
2	K. Sankaran
3	M. A. Ansari
4	M.S. Menon
5	P. T. Raman Nair
6	T. C. Raghavan
7	P. Govindan Nair
8	V. P. Gopalan Nambiyar
9	V. Balakrishna Eradi
10	P. Subramonian Poti
11	K. Bhaskaran
12	V. S. Malimath
13	V. S. Malimath
14	M. Jagannadha Rao
15	Sujata V. Manohar
16	M. M. Pareed Pillay
17	U. P. Singh
18	Om Prakash
19	Arijit Pasayat
21	ArvindVinayakarao Savant
22	K.K. Usha
23	B. N. Srikrishna
24	Jawahar Lal Gupta
25	Nauvdip Kumar Sodhi
26	B. Subhashan Reddy
27	Cyriac Joseph (Acting Chief Justice)
28	Rajeev Gupta
29	V.K. Bali
30	K. S. Radhakrishnan (as Acting Chief Justice)

[edit] Controversy

The High of Kerala building in Kochi has not assigned Number 13 to any of its courtrooms due to Triskaidekaphobia. This has become controversy in Kerala as the state that prides itself on being the most literate in India. A petitioner has questioned this in high court itself that it was due to superstitious beliefs, as the existing room after No 12 was No 14. After hearing this petition, the high court not only dismissed it, but to impose a fine of Rs. 10,000 on the petitioner. Later, the Supreme Court of India has overruled High Court’s decision by not to encourage this kind of false beliefs. The Supreme Court further added. "The High Court is an institution. It should not be allowed to encourage this sort of superstitions," ^{[28] [29] [30]}

[edit] See also

• High Courts of India

[edit] Citations

[edit] See also

• High Court of Kerala
• History of present judiciary in Kerala
• Calendar of High Court of Kerala
• Judges of High Court of Kerala
• Speech at the inauguration of the new building
• Daily Cause List of High Court of Kerala
• Daily Cause Lists of the various High Courts in India

High Courts of India

Allahabad High Court • Andhra Pradesh High Court • Bombay High Court • Calcutta High Court • Chhattisgarh High Court • Delhi High Court • Gujarat High Court • Guwahati High Court • Himachal Pradesh High Court • Jammu and Kashmir High Court • Jharkhand High Court • Karnataka High Court • Kerala High Court • Madhya Pradesh High Court • Madras High Court • Orissa High Court • Patna High Court • Punjab and Haryana High Court • Rajasthan High Court • Sikkim High Court • Uttarakhand High Court

Coordinates: 9°59′10″N 76°16′29″E / 9.98611, 76.27472