NEW DELHI: After allowing appointments of retired judges to expedite adjudication of criminal appeals in the HCs, the Supreme Court intends to devise means, modes and methods in interaction with trial court judges to expeditiously tackle the pendency of 4.6 crore cases in the district judiciary.
CJI Sanjiv Khanna and two most senior judges – Justices B R Gavai and Surya Kant – will on Saturday interact with senior district judges coming from across the country to analyze the status of implementation of 2024 Action Plan prepared by National Court Management Systems Committee.
The first session chaired by CJI Khanna and Justices A S Oka, B V Nagarathna and Dipankar Datta will identify bottlenecks in case disposal and devising strategies to reduce the backlog of cases at different levels. Addressing issues regarding the functioning of Family Courts and Special Courts; exploring feasibility of having Evening Courts, expeditious disposal of cases through Alternate Dispute Resolution (ADR) mechanisms and similar issues.
What is encouraging from the statistics available on National Judicial Data Grid is that of the 4.6 crore pending cases, a vast majority in 3.4 crore cases are less than one year old. Additionally, the trial courts disposed of 43 lakh cases last month as against the institution of 25 lakh fresh cases.
The second session chaired by Justice Gavai with Justices P S Narasimha and K V Viswanathan would strategize on streamlining and categorisation of cases, increased use of information technology to expand the virtual court footprints and opening of more e-Sewa Kendras/Kiosks to facilitate e-filing of cases by lawyers and litigants.
Third session chaired by Justice Surya Kant with Justices J K Maheshawri and S Dhulia will debate and devise plans for optimum use of human resources in the district judiciary while ensuring timely filling up of vacancies in judicial posts, empanelment of competent public prosecutors and aim for improving the legal aid machinery.
Final session, which will involve the CJI and Justices Vikram Nath, M M Sundresh and Bela Trivedi, would focus on career progression of judicial officers and mentoring of trial judges by inspecting HC judges in addition to devising training programmes in sync with the dynamics of litigation.
