AHMEDABAD: None of the 119 working judges, nor 1,372 advocates , who took a written examination held to select 40 district judges in the state could clear it, prompting the Gujarat high court to declare the result as NIL on Monday. As per the lists on the high court’s portal, of the 119 judicial officers who failed in the written examination, 51 judges are heading court establishments across Gujarat — either as principal judges or chief judicial magistrates, as on June 2019.

The high court promoted senior civil judges to fill up 65% of the posts of district judges, according to the norm. For the remaining posts, it had to fill up 25% of the vacancies by selecting candidates from the bar, and the remaining 10% of the posts from the feeder cadre of additional district judges.

Of the 40 vacancies, 26 posts had to be filled by successful candidates who are practising lawyers. There were 14 posts of district judges, for which 119 judicial officers were in the fray.

The applications were invited in March and 1,372 advocates took the elimination test in June. The high court had cleared 494 applicants to appear in a written examination after they secured 50% marks in an online test.

The examination was conducted on August 4 and 119 judges from the feeder cadre competed for promotion in the 10% quota available for judicial officers.

HD Suthar, registrar general of the high court, said not a single candidate among the 494 advocates could score the minimum marks in the written examination.

