Justice Aniruddha Bose: Tenure in numbers

Justice Aniruddha Bose retired on 10 April 2024. He was the fifth seniormost judge of the Supreme Court at the time of his retirement. He was a member of the collegium which appointed Justice P.B.Varale in the Supreme Court. 

Justice Bose authored 67 judgements during his nearly five-year long tenure and was part of several Constitution Benches during this time. 

Figure 1 shows the expected tenure of all sitting judges of the Supreme Court. Justice Bose's tenure spanned five years, slightly below the average tenure of sitting judges, which stands at 5.3 years. He falls within the category of 20 judges of the Supreme Court who have had a tenure shorter than the average.

Justice Bose was appointed in May 2019 under the collegium led by former Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi. He was elevated to the Supreme Court along with his brother judges,  Justices B.R. Gavai, Surya Kant, and A.S. Bopanna. 

Justices B.R. Gavai and Surya Kant have longer tenures of 6.5 and 7.67 years, respectively. But Justice Bopanna who will retire on 19 May 2024 has a tenure that closely mirrors Justice Bose.

Judgements authored by Justice Bose

Figure 2 shows the total number of judgements authored by sitting judges of the Supreme Court. The bar in dark blue plots the total number of judgements authored by each judge.  The bar in yellow represents the average number of judgements written each year. 

During his five year tenure, Justice Bose authored 67 judgments, averaging approximately 13 judgments per year. When compared with brother judges appointed on the same day as Justice Bose, Justice Gavai stands out with the highest number of authored judgments at 187. Justice Bopanna has 91 judgments to his name, whereas Justice Surya Kant closely trails Justice Bose with 64 judgments.

Among all sitting judges, Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud holds the record for the maximum number of authored judgments, with 595 judgments during his tenure spanning almost 7.8 years.

Year-wise breakdown of authorship

Figure 3 is a year wise breakdown of judgements authored by Justice Bose starting from his appointment in May 2019. The green bar shows the number of judgements authored. The orange bar plots his bench activity. The blue bar shows his overall authorship rate i.e. number of judgements written out of the number of benches he was a part of each year. 

In 2019, Justice Bose authored six judgements and was a part of 86 benches. This was his highest bench activity across his five-year tenure. He had an authorship rate of 7 percent. 

2020 was a productive year for Justice Bose where he authored 19 judgements and was  part of 74 benches. This was his highest judgement output in his five year tenure. This is interesting to note as authorship of several judges dropped during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic. His authorship rate stood at 25.7 percent

His output dropped to 15 judgements in 2021, though there was a spike in bench activity. He was a part of 86 benches that year—same as 2019. His authorship rate decreased to 17.44%. 

In 2022 and 2023, Justice Bose's authorship dropped to 10 and 11 judgments respectively. 

In his last year at the Supreme Court, Justice Bose authored six judgements and was a part of 15 benches. This was his highest authorship rate at 40 percent. 

In five years, Justice Bose was a part of 382 benches with an authorship rate of 17.5 percent. 

Subject-matter of judgements

Figure 4 shows that Justice Bose delivered the highest number of judgements  in criminal matters (14). This is followed by service (11), property (9), civil (7), and Constitution (4).