While the Supreme Court of India has attained its full strength of 31 judges almost after a decade, there are 10 High Courts in the country from where there is no representation at all.

Justices B R Gavai, Surya Kant, Aniruddha Bose and A S Bopanna were administered the oath of office by the CJI in the presence of several other sitting apex court judges last week.

Though there are no specific rules for regional origin, collegium resolutions and government had tried their best to maintain regional balance in representation.

Regional representation is a Supreme Court judge’s parent high court — the court where they first became a high court judge, though one can also become a Supreme Court judge directly when one is a lawyer.

From the 25 High Courts of India, only 15 states are duly represented at the apex court currently. The Supreme Court Bar and the Bombay High Court have the maximum representation in the apex court.

Four judges — R F Nariman, U U Lalit, L Nageswara Rao and Indu Malhotra — were elevated directly from the Bar. Only Justice S M Sikri, who was elevated from the bar, has become the CJI till date.

Four Justices, including Sharad Arvind Bobde, A M Khanwilkar, D Y Chandrachud and newly elevated B R Gavai, came from the Bombay High Court. Historically too, Bombay HC has produced the most number of SC judges.

The Bombay HC also leads with seven out of the 43 Chief Justices of India having Bombay as their parent high court.

Calcutta comes next with six, followed by Allahabad with five. The Karnataka High Court has had four judges who have adorned the post of CJI.

No representation

Among 10 HCs which are not represented are J&K, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, Manipur, Sikkim and Meghalaya. Andhra,  Telangana, Himachal, Gauhati and Uttarakhand HCs have never had a CJI