Parliament has cleared the Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Amendment Bill, 2026, raising the apex court's sanctioned strength to 38 judges from 34, the first increase since 2019.
The move is aimed at boosting the court's disposal capacity amid a backlog of more than 92,000 cases, but experts say it may be insufficient in addressing the larger pendency issue without parallel reforms to address rising case inflows, judicial vacancies and the structure of appellate litigation.
"The core difficulty is that this is a supply-side remedy for a demand-side problem. Filings before the Supreme Court have been rising far faster than any realistic addition of judges can absorb," said Shri Venkatesh, founding partner at SKV Law Offices.
"Adding four judges should enable the Supreme Court to constitute more benches and hear more matters. However, judicial pendency is ultimately a system-wide problem, driven as much by rising case inflow, and litigation practices as by judicial strength," adds Mathuvanthy Mathavan, partner at Poovayya & Co.
The government's case for the amendment rests largely on the growing workload of the apex court. According to figures cited in the bill, 92,101 cases were pending before the Supreme Court as of January 1, 2026. In 2025, the court disposed of 65,615 cases against a fresh institution of 75,410 cases, highlighting the challenge of keeping pace with incoming litigation.
Venkatesh also argues that the larger pendency issue lies "sits in the district judiciary and the high courts, and a substantial proportion of sanctioned High Court judgeships across the country are lying vacant at this moment".
Keyur Gandhi, managing partner at Gandhi Law Associates, also pointed to the change being built into a larger, more-structured focus on building judicial capacity. "The amendment should therefore be viewed as one part of a broader judicial capacity-building exercise rather than a standalone solution," Gandhi said, adding that the effectiveness of the move would ultimately depend on implementation.
The debate in Parliament also extended beyond judge strength. During the Rajya Sabha discussion, concerns were raised about whether infrastructure growth has kept pace with judicial expansion. Members pointed to the need for additional courtrooms, judges' chambers and administrative facilities as the court's strength increases.
The legislation has also renewed discussion around the nature of the Supreme Court's docket. Unlike many constitutional courts globally, the Indian Supreme Court functions not only as a constitutional court but also hears a substantial volume of appeals through its special leave jurisdiction under Article 136.
Rishabh Gandhi, founder of Rishabh Gandhi and Advocates, said the volume of appeals reaching the apex court remains a key issue. "There is also a serious case for creating national appellate courts or appellate benches in different regions. They can deal with routine civil and criminal appeals, while the Supreme Court focuses on constitutional questions and matters of national importance."
Experts view the addition of judges as a useful but incomplete response to the pendency problem. "The amendment appears to miss the wood for the trees," says Amit Kapur, senior partner at Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas, arguing that India's case backlog requires reforms across the litigation chain.
Kapur said a lasting reduction in pendency would require faster filling of judicial vacancies, fewer rounds of appeals, stricter scrutiny before government entities pursue litigation, curbs on repetitive state-led litigation, greater reliance on institutional arbitration for commercial disputes and tighter controls on adjournments.
On the other hand, the increase is expected to give the court greater flexibility in constituting benches and allocating judges across regular hearings and constitution bench matters. Larger constitutional benches often require five, seven or nine judges, reducing the number available for routine civil and criminal matters. Additional sanctioned positions could help ease that constraint.
"Increasing judicial strength is likely to enable the constitution benches and regular benches to function simultaneously with greater frequency, thereby improving the rate of disposal of cases," Sameer Jain, managing partner at PSL Advocates & Solicitors, said.
"But if the object is to reduce pendency rather than to be seen to be addressing it, the levers lie elsewhere. Perhaps a narrower exercise of the Article 136 jurisdiction, the structural model the Law Commission proposed in its 229th Report, a serious government litigation policy (given that the State is by some distance the largest litigant in this country), and a rationalisation of the statutory provisions that route sectoral appeals directly to the Supreme Court, would go a longer way in reducing pendency," concluded Venkatesh.
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