Delhi High Court

Delhi High Court
Interactive map of Delhi High Court
28.6090°N 77.2361°E / 28.6090; 77.2361
Established	31 October 1966 (1966-10-31)
Jurisdiction	Delhi
Location	Shershah Road, Justice SB Marg, New Delhi
Coordinates	28.6090°N 77.2361°E / 28.6090; 77.2361
Composition method	Presidential with confirmation of Chief Justice of India
Website	delhihighcourt.nic.in
Chief Justice
Currently	Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya
Since	21 January 2025

The High Court of Delhi 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.

The 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:

See also: List of sitting judges of the high courts of India § Delhi High Court

Judges elevated to Supreme Court

Currently serving

#	Name of the Judge	Image	Date of Appointment as Judge	Date of elevation to Supreme Court	Date of Retirement	Tenure			Immediately preceding office
						As HC Judge	As Supreme Court Judge	Total tenure (including both SC and HC)
1	Manmohan		13 March 2008	5 December 2024	16 December 2027	16 years, 267 days	3 years, 12 days	19 years, 278 days	33rd CJ of Delhi HC

Former Judges

#	Name of the Judge	Image	Date of Appointment as Judge	Date of elevation to Supreme Court	Date of Retirement	Tenure			Immediately preceding office	Remarks
						As HC Judge	As Supreme Court Judge	Total tenure (including both SC and HC)
1	Srinivasachar Ranganathan		14 November 1977	5 October 1987	30 October 1992	9 years, 325 days	5 years, 26 days	14 years, 352 days	Judge of Delhi HC
2	Yogeshwar Dayal		28 February 1974	22 March 1991	2 August 1994	17 years, 22 days	3 years, 134 days	20 years, 156 days	13th CJ of Delhi HC	Died in office
3	Bhupinder Nath Kirpal		20 November 1979	11 September 1995	7 November 2002	15 years, 295 days	7 years, 58 days	22 years, 353 days	13th CJ of Gujarat HC	31st Chief Justice of India
4	Devinder Pratap Wadhwa		12 August 1983	21 March 1997	4 May 2000	13 years, 221 days	3 years, 45 days	16 years, 267 days	28th CJ of Patna HC
5	Yogesh Kumar Sabharwal		17 November 1986	28 January 2000	13 January 2007	13 years, 72 days	6 years, 351 days	20 years, 76 days	31st CJ of Bombay HC	36th Chief Justice of India
6	Arun Kumar		13 July 1990	3 October 2002	11 April 2006	12 years, 82 days	5 years, 191 days	15 years, 273 days	23rd CJ of Rajasthan HC
7	Dalveer Bhandari		19 March 1991	28 October 2005	27 April 2012	14 years, 223 days	6 years, 183 days	21 years, 40 days	34th CJ of Bombay HC	Resigned from office
8	Devinder Kumar Jain		19 March 1991	10 April 2006	24 January 2013	15 years, 22 days	6 years, 290 days	21 years, 312 days	26th CJ of Punjab & Haryana HC
9	Swatanter Kumar		10 November 1994	18 December 2009	19 December 2012	15 years, 38 days	3 years, 2 days	18 years, 40 days	37th CJ of Bombay HC
10	Madan Lokur		19 February 1999	4 June 2012	30 December 2018	13 years, 106 days	6 years, 210 days	19 years, 315 days	33rd CJ of Gauhati HC
11	Vikramajit Sen		7 July 1999	24 December 2012	30 December 2015	13 years, 170 days	3 years, 7 days	16 years, 177 days	26th CJ of Karnataka HC
12	Arjan Kumar Sikri		7 July 1999	12 April 2013	6 March 2019	13 years, 279 days	5 years, 329 days	19 years, 243 days	31st CJ of Punjab & Haryana HC
13	Sanjay Kishan Kaul		3 May 2001	17 February 2017	25 December 2023	15 years, 290 days	6 years, 312 days	22 years, 237 days	38th CJ of Madras HC
14	Sanjiv Khanna		24 June 2005	18 January 2019	13 May 2025	13 years, 208 days	6 years, 116 days	19 years, 324 days	Judge of Delhi HC	51st Chief Justice of India
15	Shripathi Ravindra Bhat		16 July 2004	23 September 2019	20 October 2023	15 years, 69 days	4 years, 28 days	19 years, 97 days	36th CJ of Rajasthan HC
16	Hima Kohli		29 May 2006	31 August 2021	1 September 2024	15 years, 94 days	3 years, 2 days	18 years, 96 days	3rd CJ of Telangana HC

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
		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

Main article: Courts in Delhi

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	Jamnapaar (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 vs. 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

See also

• Subordinate courts of Delhi High Court
• 2011 Delhi bombing, at the Delhi High Court

External links

• Official website