SB Sinha

The Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Authority (TDSAT) is now practically defunct, after the body’s only serving member PK Rastogi retired, as predicted in a column on Legally India in January. According to an Economic Times’  telecommunications ministry source, the appointment process for one of two members, former MTNL managing director Kuldeep Singh, has begun.

The tribunal has not had a chairman since former Supreme Court (SC) judge SB Sinha retired from the chair in November 2012. Former SC judge Cyriac Joseph, who was reportedly appointed to take the chair after Sinha, has not joined to date.

According to ET, the process of appointment was underway and the members will be announced before the month-end, although it another source told the paper that the Chief Justice of India (CJI), who takes a call on chairmans' appointments, had not yet recommended names for the position. [ET]

How is the TDSAT going to function without members, asks Delhi advocate Nidhi Parashar.

The Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) got a new chairman in former Supreme Court judge Cyriac Joseph. Joseph who retired from the SC on 27 January after three-and-a-half years on the roster, succeeds former SC judge SB Sinha at the chair after Sinha’s retirement last month.

He is a former chief justice of Uttaranchal high court as well as Karnataka high court.

Joseph enrolled at the bar in 1968, became the senior government pleader in Kerala high court in 1979 until 1987, was Additional Advocate General in Kerala for three years from 1991, and was appointed as a permanent judge of Kerala high court for a month in 1994.

He was transferred to Delhi high court that year, and was appointed as Uttaranchal high court’s chief justice in March 2005. Next year he became chief justice of Karnataka high court. [Indian Television]

Sinha was appointed as chairman in September 2009, succeeding former SC judge Arun Kumar.