A Bench in Chennai Is Not the Answer to a Bench in Every Capital
The India Commentary view
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By Our Editorial Team
First publised on 2026-11-05 03:17:31
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The India Commentary view
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Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay has asked the Prime Minister for a permanent Supreme Court bench in Chennai. The grievance is real. The remedy he seeks is incomplete. The demand deserves a serious answer, and that answer is neither a flat refusal nor a quick concession.
The law is not the obstacle. Article 130 lets the Supreme Court sit outside Delhi at places the Chief Justice of India appoints, with the Presidentâs approval. The power lies with the Chief Justice, not with the Prime Minister, so a letter to Mr Modi is political signalling and not a constitutional step. The Court itself, in 2015, dismissed a plea for a Chennai bench and said the time was not right. That was a decision about timing, not about constitutionality.
Nor is the idea fringe. The Law Commission recommended four regional benches in its 229th report: Delhi, Chennai or Hyderabad, Kolkata and Mumbai. A parliamentary committee has urged the use of Article 130 at four or five locations, and the Law Ministry has reportedly accepted that recommendation. Chennai has been on that list for years.
The fear that every state will then demand its own bench is legitimate, and the proposalâs own design answers it. The expert reports speak of zones, not states, and of a constitutional bench kept in Delhi. A fixed number of zonal benches, written down in advance with clear criteria, is a defensible limit. A bench for every capital, or two for Uttar Pradesh, is not. High Court bench politics in this country show what happens when no such limit exists. One concession invites the next.
The deeper problem is that Mr Vijay is arguing about location when the real question is jurisdiction. Foreign comparisons help only if they are read carefully. The United States, Canada and Brazil keep their apex courts in a single city. But they differ from India in their federal arrangements, legal traditions and the way their apex courts connect to the rest of the judiciary. Australiaâs High Court sits in several cities, and Pakistanâs Supreme Court hears cases at registries in provincial capitals. So there is no universal rule on where an apex court must sit. The useful lesson concerns design. All three countries have appellate courts below the apex court and ways to limit what reaches it. Indiaâs Supreme Court is also an ordinary court of appeal, open to special leave petitions in large numbers,without a national intermediate appellate tier between the High Courts and itself . That is why Delhi is overwhelmed. Moving the Courtâs address without changing its role will not cut pendency. It will spread it.
The Centre and the Chief Justice should not treat this as a stateâs special pleading. They should take up the Law Commission scheme as a whole: a small constitutional court in Delhi, a few regional appellate benches, and a fixed ceiling. Tamil Nadu is entitled to ask for Chennai. The country is entitled to a plan that does not stop at Chennai.
