ORDER 1. Special leave granted. 2. We have heard counsel for the contesting parties as well as the intervenors . This Court by the judgment rendered in Writ Petition No. 1022 of 1989 on November 13, 1991 in All India Judges Assn. v. Union of India{ (1992) 1 SCC 119 : 1992 SCC (L&S) 9 : (1992) 19 ATC 42}, gave certain directions in para 63, one of which is as follows : (SCC p. 140) "(iii) Retirement age of judicial officers be raised to 60 years and appropriate steps are to be taken by December 31,1992." 3. However, the observation in para 25 of the judgment reads as under: (SCC p. 128) "We accordingly direct that appropriate alterations shall be made in the Rules obtaining in the States and Union Territories in respect of judicial service so as to fix the age of retirement at 60 years with effect from December 31, 1992. We have given a long period so that appropriate amendments may be made in the meantime." 4. This observation is understood by the State of U.P. to mean that the age of retirement has to be raised to 60 years with effect from December 31, 1992 and not earlier. We would like to make it clear that the final direction given in para 63 extracted above makes it clear that what this Court intended was to ensure that by December 31, 1992 the age of retirement of all Judicial Officers shall be raised to 60 years. We were aware that it would require amendment of the relevant service rules and hence we had fixed the outer limit of December 31, 1992. We propose to make it clear that the observations in para 25 extracted above were not intended to preclude the State Government from giving effect to our direction in para 63 before December 31, 1992. We, therefore, clarify the position by stating that it would be open to the State Governments and Union Territories to raise the age of retirement to 60 years even before December 31, 1992. In this view of the matter, we think that the High Court was not right in restraining the State Government from retiring Judicial Officers from service on their attaining the age of 58 years by the interim order. In this view of the matter, we think that the High Court was not right in restraining the State Government from retiring Judicial Officers from service on their attaining the age of 58 years by the interim order. What the High Court has done is to treat the Judicial Officers as continuing in service after November 13, 1991, i.e. the date of this Courts judgment under consideration as if we had directed raising of the age of retirement to 60 years from the date of our judgment. The direction given was that the State Governments and the Union Territories should take appropriate steps to raise the age of retirement of Judicial Officers to 60 years before December 31, 1992. In that view of the matter, we think that the impugned order passed by the High Court cannot be sustained. We, therefore, set it aside. 5. We, however, do hope that the State Governments and Union Territories will undertake the exercise for raising the age of retirement to 60 years as per our directive in para 63 of the judgment as early as possible without waiting for the outer date of December 31, 1992. With these observations, we allow the appeal and set aside the impugned order of the High Court. The interim order passed by this Court will now not survive. There will be no order as to costs. 6. Intervention application is allowed. For Citation : 1992 Supp (2) SCC 649. Vikas Info Solutions Pvt. Ltd.