Beyond the Headlines: How India Actually Appoints Its Judges — The Collegium System Explained

With 2025 bringing a change of Chief Justice and a fresh crop of year-end reviews of Supreme Court judgments, here is what the Constitution actually says — and does not say — about how judges reach the Bench.

In 2025, India saw the customary transition in the office of Chief Justice, with the senior-most judge succeeding as convention dictates, alongside routine appointments and transfers of Supreme Court and High Court judges. These were all decided not by any statute but through recommendations of collegiums of sitting judges — a process the Constitution's text never names.

Articles 124, 217 and 222 speak only of presidential appointment after "consultation" with the Chief Justice of India. Through successive judgments, the Supreme Court read "consultation" as effective concurrence, creating the collegium and giving judges primacy over their own appointments. This is tied to the basic structure doctrine (judicial independence, Article 50, Article 141), which the Court invoked to strike down the National Judicial Appointments Commission amendment as unconstitutional.

Remember: collegium is judge-made law, not constitutional text; key linkage is Articles 124/217/222, basic structure doctrine, NJAC judgment, and the Memorandum of Procedure.