Data shows shortage of senior law officers in India

A number of positions of senior government law officers are lying vacant, including some for about a year, even as nearly 15,000 cases are pending in the Supreme Court where the Centre is a party, according to official data.

The post of solicitor general, the second senior-most government law officer, is lying vacant since Ranjeet Kumar resigned on October 20, 2017.

Data from the Department of Legal Affairs, Ministry of Law, shows that four posts of additional solicitors general also need to be filled.

The number of additional solicitors general has dropped to 7 from 11 during the UPA II rule. Sandeep Sethi had recently stepped down as additional solicitor general.

The seven additional solicitors general at present are -- Maninder Singh, Tushar Mehta, Atmaram Nadkarni, Pinky Anand, Vikramjit Banerjee, Aman Lekhi and P S Narasimha.

The vacancies assume importance as the central government is a party -- either the petitioner or the respondent -- to "approximately 15,000 cases" in the top court, a senior government functionary said.

According to the Indian Judiciary Annual Report 2015-2016, as many as 60,938 cases are pending in the apex court as on September 30, 2016. Out of these 10,733 are criminal cases while 50,205 are civil suits. 

(With inputs from agencies.)