The Supreme Court has affirmed the decision of the Telangana government to mandate proficiency in Telugu for individuals seeking positions in the state judiciary. On April 28, 2025, a bench of Justices B.R. Gavai and A.G. Masih dismissed a petition challenging the Telangana High Court's ruling, which upheld the state's requirement of Telugu language proficiency for candidates aspiring to be civil judges.
The petitioner, Mohd Shujath Hussain, argued that the Telangana Judicial (Service and Cadre) Rules, 2023, were discriminatory because they did not recognize Urdu proficiency as an alternative, despite Urdu being the state's second official language. Hussain, who studied in Urdu medium, requested that the recruitment process allow candidates to take the examination in Urdu. He contended that this would be fair, considering the significant Urdu-speaking population in Telangana. He also pointed out that a portion of the written test required candidates to translate Telugu text into English.
The Supreme Court, however, did not find merit in the petitioner's argument. The court observed that the rules did not exclude Urdu speakers from applying but simply required all candidates to possess proficiency in Telugu, the most widely spoken language in the state. The bench emphasized that the inclusion of Telugu in the rules was an additional requirement and did not constitute an exclusion of Urdu. The Supreme Court made it clear that the requirement for Telugu proficiency was an additional qualification and did not amount to discrimination against Urdu speakers.
The Telangana Judicial (Service and Cadre) Rules, 2023, which came into effect in June 2023, introduced a translation component in the recruitment exams, requiring candidates to translate between English and Telugu. The High Court had previously noted that the state government was within its rights to set such qualifications, as it is best positioned to determine the needs of its judicial services. The Supreme Court agreed that administrative convenience and the effective functioning of the judiciary are legitimate concerns when setting language qualifications.
