Process to appoint 6 new Judges of High Court started: Sagar
Neeraj Rohmetra
JAMMU, Apr 25: While legal luminaries of the country in general and this border State in particular have been emphatically repeating the adage: “Justice delayed is justice denied”, the long list of cases pending in the High Court and the Subordinate Courts for the past decade or even more tell a different story!
Astonishingly, nearly 24,000 cases in the Subordinate Courts and about 200 cases in the State High Court have been pending for the past 10-15 years. These facts have been revealed in the data collected by the monitoring cell of Department of Justice, Union Ministry of Law and Justice in its report.
According to the latest figures, nearly 2.5 lakh cases are still pending in various Courts including both the wings of State High Court. About 17,000 cases pending with the Subordinate Courts for the past 5-10 years, whilst as nearly 9500 cases are lying with the High Court for disposal.
Further, nearly 12,500 cases in Subordinate Courts and about 7700 cases in High Court were also awaiting their disposal since the past 3-5 years. There were also 35,000 cases in High Court and 38,000 cases in lower Courts pending for the past 1-3 years.
Other parts of the country, where the cases pending for the past 10-15 years included Allahabad (749627), Andhra Pradesh (13,930), Bombay (145078), Calcutta (249676), Delhi (36086), Gujarat (324293), Himachal Pradesh (863), Karnataka (13541), Kerala (10915), Madras (35412), Madhya Pradesh (1078509), Orissa (47460), Patna (1204930), Punjab & Haryana (899545), Rajasthan (1455264), Sikkim (676), Uttarakhand (206233), Chattisgarh (338337), Jharkhand (304423) and several other North Eastern States (385326).
Peeved over the long pendency of cases, the Union Law Ministry in various communications had also suggested a road map for improving justice delivery and legal reforms and steps to reduce the pendency in Courts. The Ministry had suggested launching of campaign to reduce the percentage of pending cases.
Law, Parliament and Justice Affairs Minister, Ali Mohammad Sagar while reacting to the long list of pendency stated that the State Government in consultation with the judiciary had initiated several measures to reduce the cases pending in different Courts for the past several years. “After several years, the Government has also initiated the process of filling up the post of Judges and six Judges of the High Court are likely to be appointed soon. This step would go a long way to reduce the work burden over the existing Judges in the High Courts and would also help decrease the pendency levels”, he said.
To further reduce the pending list of cases, the Government has been organising regular campaigns in the form of Lok Adalats and other means like Alternate Dispute Resolution (ADR). Besides, an impetus is being given to improve the existing infrastructure in various Courts of the State.
As per the Vision Document prepared by the Union Law Ministry, the State Government has also initiated the process of appointment of Court Managers in some Courts of the State.
The Union Ministry has also launched the project of E-Courts to facilitate Information and Communication Technology (ICT) implementation in all Courts and pave way for better management in Courts. For greater ease of functioning, funds for technical manpower hiring and data entry have been placed at the disposal of High Courts. The software deliverables have been developed in consultation with the High Courts and sufficient funds for training are provided.
However, the project of E-Courts is also facing several hiccups at different levels in the State. “In several cases there are procedural delays while there are other cases where the vendors aren’t cooperating with the implementing agencies”.
Commenting on the state of affairs, official sources said that the Jammu district Court is under City Civil project before E-court and all the hardware is obsolete as per the CIS software concerned. The existing hardware infrastructure, which has been provided to the High Court is quite old and is of no use.
“All the district Courts are facing the problems of UPS system and the vendors have also failed to resolve the problem. This has happened despite the fact that the authorities had emailed the vendors directing them for instant resolution of the complaints”, sources said.
At Leh / Kargil district the entire hardware it yet to be delivered and installed and the agencies aren’t getting any cooperation from the vendors. Several sites in the Kashmir Division are also facing have hardware problems. The agencies have also approached the State Government requesting for funds to replace the hardware, which had been damaged due to fire in the building.
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