From Kania to Sarkaria

This essay is a critical analysis of the dynamics of executive-judiciary relations in judicial appointments from 1950 to 1973. It serves as a primer for the appointments made to the Supreme Court from 1950–73, the supersessions that were apprehended but did not come about, and generally, what weighed with the judges as well as the executive while making appointments in the years immediately after the Constitution came into force. The essay traverses the historical journey of appointments to the Supreme Court from the tenure of the first Chief Justice of India, Justice H.J. Kania, to the appointment of Justice R.S. Sarkaria in 1973. It provides insights, and in some cases, hitherto unknown facts about the factors that prompted the appointment of certain justices to the Court. The essay also documents the gradual incursion that the executive had begun to make in judicial appointments in the latter half of the 1960s.