Chief Justice of India Justice Surya Kant will visit Ladakh on Sunday to inaugurate the newly constituted Ladakh bench of the High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, Ladakh Chief Secretary Ashish Kundra said at a press conference on Saturday. The move will allow people in the Union Territory to pursue writ petitions closer to home instead of travelling to Srinagar or Jammu.
Justice Surya Kant will be accompanied by four Supreme Court judges, the Chief Justice of the Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh High Court, and other high court judges, Kundra said. The Attorney General of India will also attend the inauguration, according to the Chief Secretary.
Kundra described the establishment of the Ladakh High Court bench as a significant development in the recent history of India’s High Courts. He said he could recall no comparable instance in the last 40 years of a sitting bench being established in this manner for another High Court, apart from the example of benches of the Guwahati High Court in Arunachal Pradesh.
“Justice coming closer to the people is a very big thing,” Kundra said. He added that people who were aggrieved and wanted to file a writ petition had otherwise been required to travel to Srinagar or Jammu. The creation of a bench in Ladakh would make that process possible within the Union Territory, he said.
The announcement is particularly significant for a region where distance and terrain can complicate access to public institutions. Kundra said the Government of India understood the difficulty of the terrain, the challenging circumstances in which people lived and the importance of making justice accessible closer to their doorstep.
The Chief Secretary said the bench had been established within two months. He also said it was not among the demands raised during negotiations between Ladakhi political leaders and the Ministry of Home Affairs, describing it as a unilateral initiative by the Centre.
The development comes as negotiations continue between Ladakhi political leaders and the Ministry of Home Affairs. Ladakhi leaders are seeking a Union Territory with a legislature and constitutional safeguards under Article 371. The press conference did not indicate that the establishment of the High Court bench had resolved those broader political demands.
The proposed bench therefore addresses one specific institutional issue: the location and accessibility of High Court proceedings for residents of Ladakh. Its inauguration on Sunday will mark the next formal step in creating a local judicial presence under the High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, with senior members of the judiciary and the Attorney General scheduled to attend.
