Odisha High Court

Orissa High Court
Established	1948
Country	India
Location	Cuttack, Odisha
Composition method	Presidential with confirmation of Chief Justice of India and Governor of respective state.
Authorized by	Constitution of India
Decisions are appealed to	Supreme Court of India
Judge term length	Till 62 years of age
Number of positions	27
Website	http://www.orissahighcourt.nic.in
Chief Justice
Currently	D. H. Waghela
Since	6 August 2014

View of High Court of Odisha new building from Ravenshaw Collegiate School

The Orissa High Court is the High Court of the state of Odisha.

Bengal Presidency was a vast province including present day Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, and West Bengal. It was difficult to administratively manage such a vast area, inhabited by people speaking in different languages and having different traditions. Administrative exigencies required separation of such areas which originally did not from part of Bengal. So, new province of Bihar and Orissa was formed on 22 March 1912. However, the said new province of Bihar and Orissa was under the jurisdiction of Calcutta High Court.

On 9 February 1916, in exercise of the powers under Section 113 of the Government of India Act, 1915, the King of England issued letters of patent constituting High Court of Patna. Orissa was placed under the jurisdiction of Patna High Court. Although, on 18 May 1916, Circuit Court of Patna High Court for Orissa held its first sitting at Cuttack.

On 1 April 1936, Orissa was made a separate province but no separate High Court was provided for it. People raised their voice for a separate High Court in their state. After a long battle, Government of India agreed to create a new High Court, and for that purpose the Government of India issued the Orissa High Court Order, 1948, under the Section 229(1) of the Government of India Act, 1935, on 30 April 1948. This order clearly stated that "from the 5th day of July, 1948, there shall be a Court for the Province of Orissa, which shall be a Court of Record". Finally, on 26 July 1948, Orissa High Court was formally inaugurated.

The seat of the court is Cuttack. The court has a sanctioned judge strength of 27.

The Chief Justice

The present Chief Justice of the Odisha High Court is D. H. Waghela.

Former Chief Justices

#	Chief Justice	Term
1	Bira Kishore Ray	26 July 1948 – 30 October 1951
2	B. Jagannadha Das	31 October 1951 – 3 March 1953
3	Lingaraj Panigrahi	4 March 1953 – 21 March 1956
4	R. Laxman Narasimham	22 March 1956 – 27 December 1964
5	Khaleel Ahmed	18 January 1965 – 5 April 1967
6	Satya Bhusan Burman	6 April 1967 – 30 April 1969
7	Gati Krushna Misra	1 May 1969 – 30 October 1975
8	Siba Narayan Shankar	1 November 1975 – 12 October 1977
9	Sukanta Kishor Ray	13 October 1977 – 4 November 1980
10	Ranganath Mishra	16 January 1981 – 14 March 1983
11	Dambarudhar Pathak	11 August 1983 – 28 February 1986
12	Harilal Agrawal	1 May 1986 – 31 July 1989
13	Banwarilal Hansaria	22 February 1990 – 13 December 1993
14	Girish Thakurlal Nanavati	31 January 1994 – 27 September 1994
15	Vallabhdas Aidan Mohta	28 September 1994 – 25 April 1995
16	Sailendu Nath Pukhan	2 August 1996 – 27 January 1999
17	Biswanath Agrawal	18 November 1999 – 18 October 2000
18	N.Y. Hanumanthapa	17 February 2001 – 24 September 2001
19	P.K. Balsubramanyan	5 December 2001 – 10 March 2003
20	Sujit Barman Roy	9 April 2003 – 27 January 2007
21	A.K. Ganguly	2 March 2007 – 18 May 2008
22	Balbir Singh Chauhan	16 July 2008 – 10 May 2009
23	I.M. Quddusi	11 May 2009 – 13 November 2009
24	Bilal Nazki	14 November 2009 – 17 November 2009
25	V.Gopal Gowda	25 March 2010 – 26 February 2013
26	C.Nagappan	27 February 2013 – 16 September 2013
27	Adarsh Kumar Goel	10 October 2013 - July 2014
28	Amitava Roy	5 August 2014 – 25 February 2015