Court Data
% of Constitution Bench Judgments: Monsoon Session v. Year
Comparative Analysis of the number of constitutional bench judgments between the monsoon session and the rest of the year.
The Supreme Court Observer divides the judicial calendar into four seasonal sessions as a means of analysing the Supreme Court of India’s performance. Officially, the Supreme Court does not follow a session calendar. Nevertheless, we have found it a useful analytical tool:
Winter ‘17 (October 3rd- December 15th)
Spring ’18 (January 4th – February 24th)
Summer ’18 (March 5th – May 19th)
Monsoon ‘18 (July 2nd – October 13th)
The Monsoon Session saw a very high number of Constitution Bench (CB) judgments delivered. If one compares the total number CB judgments delivered across the entire year, one finds that 60% of all CB judgments were delivered during the Monsoon Session. The Monsoon 2018 Session saw 9 CB judgments delivered. The total number of CB judgments delivered across the entire year was 15.
Winter ’17 – 2 CB judgments
Spring ’18 – 0 CB judgments
Summer ’18 – 4 CB judgments
Monsoon ’18 – 9 CB judgments
It is important to note that the Monsoon Session is, along with the Winter Session, the longest session. However, even if one adjusts for the number of days in each session, the Monsoon Session saw a proportionally higher number of CB judgments. For the Monsoon Session the proportion of CB judgments to number of days in the Session is 0.09, whereas the average proportion of CB judgments to number of days for the other three Sessions is 0.03.
Winter ’17 – 104 days
Spring ’18 – 52 days
Summer ’18 – 76 days
Monsoon ’18 – 104 days