Few Delhi HC judges disclose assets, transparency declines over years

Decline in asset disclosures by Delhi High Court judges prompts calls for mandatory annual declarations for transparency.

Only seven Delhi High Court judges have disclosed their assets on the official website out of a current strength of 39 judges.

Interestingly, while the website indicates that Justice Yashyant Verma, who is the second senior most judge in the Delhi High Court, has uploaded his asset declaration, the file available for viewing is a “Dummy PDF file.”

The voluntary declarations of assets in public domain followed a full court resolution of the Delhi high court on August 8, 2009 to bring in transparency in the judiciary.

Over the past six years, there has been a decline in the number of Delhi High Court judges who have disclosed their assets on the official website. In 2018, 29 judges out of a total strength of 35 judges had made such declarations.

The Delhi high court also has an archived list of 64 judges - some of whom were elevated to Supreme Court, transferred to other high courts or retired, declared their assets on the website. Some judges had already disclosed their assets as early as February 2010.

Apart from the Delhi, only six other high courts - High Court of Chhattisgarh, High Court of Himachal Pradesh, High Court of Karnataka, Madras High Court, High Court of Punjab and Haryana, and High Court of Kerala - out of 25 in the country have sitting judges declared their assets on their respective websites.

The official website of the Supreme Court shows that out of a current strength of 33 judges, 28 judges including the Chief Justice of India, Justice Sanjiv Khanna have “submitted their declarations of assets”.