In this article, Ashish Pratap Singh discusses Pendency of cases in India and how the Indian Judiciary is coping with the problem?

The pendency of cases in Indian Courts is not a new phenomenon to read or to discuss. But coming out of the problem, the Indian Judiciary along with the legislative and the executive wing is trying to overcome the situation.

The following article not only covers the reasons for pendency of cases but also put forths the solutions through which the judiciary, executive, and the legislature are trying to overcome the above problem. Let us take a look at reasons for pendency of cases and how the judiciary is coping with the problem.

Reasons for pendency of cases

Reason 1 Judiciary not having sufficient number of judges

The most prominent reason for the pendency of cases is the inadequate representation of judges in the Indian Judiciary. The number of judges is way less than required. The essential purpose of justice cannot be met if we do not have the required judges to decide the case. The problem lies not only at the subordinate level of the judiciary but also in the higher judiciary.

The vacancies existing at the Courts, both lower and the higher are not duly filled. With an already low proportion of judges is to a number of cases, the Indian judiciary is lacking the minimum basic requirement of judges strength. Vacancies of judges effect drastically the pendency of cases. Both are in fact inversely proportional to one another.

Various judges of the Apex Court have addressed this issue. The former Chief Justice of India, Retd. Justice T.S. Thakur spoke about government’s inaction in raising the number of judges.  In the same scenario once, then Chief Justice of India H.L. Dattu suggested that a deadline of five years has to be set to make sure that trial cases do not go too longer. According to

According to Law Minister D V Sadananda Gowda in 2016 there were four vacancies in the Supreme Court and as on 10^th November 2015 there were 426 vacancies in the High Courts. Total approved Strength in High Court is 1,029. There are vacancies in subordinate courts too, with the total strength of 20,358 only 15,360 were occupied and rest were held vacant.

A brief study says we have 13 Judges per 1 million people in our country, where as the need is of  50 Judges per 1 million people. But this is not the first time we are facing this issue, in 1987 too, Law Commission recommended increasing the number of judges from 10 Judge per  Million to 50 Judges per million. The result of not taking the recommendation seriously has resulted in Three Crore pending cases and still we are not learning from our prior mistakes which will further result in more pendency, further then Law minister D.V. Sadananda Gowda had in the beginning of 2016 said that to cope up with the problem of pendency of cases his government will prepare a National Litigation Policy that will bring down the number of cases.

Reason 2 Filing of false cases

The second big reason for the pendency of cases in Indian courts is filing false cases with malafide intent for causing unnecessary troubles to others. Yes, I am trying to draw your attention towards filing of fake cases in order to solve vendetta. There is filing of case, then there is investigation of the same, and if proofs are available or not the continuity or discontinuity of the same depends but due to all this, the precious time of court is already unnecessarily wasted. And as a result of all this there is a delay in justice.

Delhi Commission of Women (DCW) exposed shocking statistics that 53.2 per cent rape cases filed between April 2013-July 2014 in Delhi were found ‘false’. The report says that between aforesaid dates the number of rape cases filed in Delhi were 2,753 out of which, only 1,287 cases were found to be true, and remaining 1,464 cases were found to be fake. Report further revealed that between June 2013 and 5^th December 2013, the number of false cases were 525 and in between January 2014 and July 2014, the number of false rape case were 900. This is the story of Delhi, National capital of India with the population of 18.98 Million.

Reason 3 Unnecessary delays caused because of administrative apathy

Third reason according to me for the pendency of cases in Indian courts is the rise in misuse of law. For an instance, the report of one of the renowned National newspapers of our nation, there are approximately 1 lac. Cases of dowry filed every year out of which 10 per cent are found false.

Then at times there are situations when counsels try to play their card, they either request for giving further date by giving various reasons or they are not present so that they get next date for hearing due to which there is unnecessary delay in case proceeding. Counsels try to extract more time for preparation of cases.

Reason 4 Inadequate Infrastructures of the subordinate courts in India

Day by day people are getting aware of law and are becoming literate, number of cases filed every year is increasing. According to the National Judicial Data Grid website as on December 31, 2015 2.6 Crore cases are pending only in lower courts of which 41.38% cases have been pending for less than two years and 10.83% have been pending for over two years.

Steps taken by the judiciary to deal with the issue of pendency of cases

Alternate Dispute Resolutions

Several High courts have established arrear committees  to deal with the problem of pendency. Lok Adalats are being held and cases are resolved quickly there.  In 2015, 44 lakh cases were cleared in Lok Adalat itself. Apart from mega Lok Adalats, weekly and monthly Lok Adalats are also being held.

Fast Track Courts was the first implemented solution to the problem of pendency of cases. Out of 36 lakh cases that were once transferred to Fast Track Courts, near about 30.7 Lac have been disposed of. Setting up E-courts and fast track courts can escalate the process of clearing out pending cases. Judicial Infrastructure needs to be given equal importance as well because even if the 20,502 posts of judges in the subordinate judiciary are filled, we’ll need almost 4000 extra courtrooms to accommodate them. These small steps will somehow reduce the pendency of cases and will surely add up to the strengthening of judiciary in the nation.

Legislatures initiative: Scrapping of redundant laws

It was found that obsolete and redundant laws not only create confusion among citizens but also increase pendency of cases, as there are various views from various people. Hence government has emphasized on the e-courts project and has already computerized 13,273 courts. Government is focusing on building of more court halls. At present 2,600 new court halls are under construction. Currently near about 15,500 court halls are available. The Commercial Courts Act has also been passed in order to solve commercial disputes in time bound manner.

Reference

http://indianexpress.com/article/explained/study-shows-pendency-of-cases-longest-in-allahabad-hc-shortest-in-sikkim-2970050/

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/high-level-disaster-meet-to-focus-on-resilient-infra/articleshow/57763042.cms

http://www.legallyindia.com/tag/pendency

http://www.oneindia.com/feature/problem-of-pendency-of-cases-in-india-2080046.html

http://www.business-standard.com/article/international/state-of-indian-judiciary-rising-pendency-of-cases-and-workload-of-judges-116081600024_1.html