The Madras High Court got an acting chief justice after Chief Justice VK Tahilramani’s resignation was accepted by President Ram Nath Kovind, ANI reported on Saturday. The acting chief justice will be Vineet Kothari, ANI said.

Tahilramani’s resignation has been accepted with effect from September 6, PTI reported citing a government notification.

Tahilramani had resigned on September 6 and sent her resignation to Kovind the following day. She quit after the Supreme Court Collegium refused her request to reconsider its recommendation to transfer her as the chief justice of the Meghalaya High Court.

Tahilramani was the senior-most High Court judge in the country. The decision to transfer the judge was taken by the collegium based on the feedback received from the Madras High Court. The collegium has already transferred Justice AK Mittal, who was the Meghalaya chief justice, to take over from Tahilramani at the Madras High Court.

Tahilramani took over as the chief justice of the Madras High Court on August 12 last year. While at the Bombay High Court in May 2017, Tahilramanai had upheld the convictions in the Bilkis Bano gangrape case. She was due to retire from service on October 2, 2020, but the sudden transfer to a much smaller High Court had reportedly upset her.

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