M J Antony: Endless wait for justice

Starved of funds and personnel, legal system is in danger of collapsing

The latest statistics released by the Supreme Court regarding cases pending in the various courts in the country point to the stupendous task before the new law minister. The 100-day agenda declared by the government includes a roadmap for judicial reform to be outlined in six months and implemented in a time-bound manner. The forthcoming budget also has to take care of courts and their infrastructure, which was getting only 0.2 per cent of the share, far below health and education.

According to the figures released by the apex court last month, there has been little improvement in in the disposal of cases in recent years. In fact, the pace has slowed down. The civil and criminal cases pending in the subordinate courts, where the citizen comes into contact with the judicial system for the first time, have gone up. Two years ago, the number of cases pending in the subordinate courts was around 25 million. Now it is roughly 26.4 million. Civil cases pending now are 7,539,848 and criminal cases, 18,869,163. In three months between October 1, 2008, and December 31, 2008, the number of civil cases shot up from 7,496,063 to 7,539,848 despite the disposal of 951,406 cases.

The high courts are also struggling with huge numbers. The total for all the 21 high courts is 3,874,090. The Allahabad High Court leads with 911,858 cases pending, followed by the Madras High Court with 451,496, Bombay High Court with 336,080 and the Calcutta High Court with 300,473. The Supreme Court showed an increase of pending cases in the first quarter of the year. While the figure at the year-end was 49,819, at the end of March, it was 50,163.

One major factor for this state of affairs is the number of vacancies of judges in all courts. At the district and subordinate levels, there were 3,129 vacancies out of the total sanctioned strength of 16,685. Uttar Pradesh led with 523 vacancies, followed by Maharashtra (259), Bihar (251), Delhi (226) and Karnataka (216). Only Daman & Diu had the full complement of three judges.

The high courts have a sanctioned strength of 886 judges, but 251 posts are vacant. The Allahabad High Court, which has a sanctioned strength of 160 judges, has 88 vacancies. The figures for the Calcutta High Court are 22 vacancies out of 58 and for the Punjab and Haryana High Court, 20 out of 68. The sanctioned strength of the Supreme Court was recently raised to 31, but the working strength is 26.

Apart from shortage of judges, shortage of funds is another major cause for the cracks in the system. A former chief justice lamented that “as the position stands at present, every high court and the judicial system is starved of funds. The expenditure on judiciary in this country is only 0.2 per cent of the GNP as compared to 4.3 per cent in the UK. More than half of the expenditure on judiciary is generated by the judiciary itself through court fees and fines.”

The financial crunch shows in several ways. The judge-population ratio is 10.5 judges per million. This should be contrasted with the Law Commission recommendation made decades ago that the ideal ratio would be 50 judges per million. Harassed and low-paid judges cannot be expected to impart justice fairly in the face of pressure from the lawyers and their mighty clients. The judiciary does not attract the best talent these days as a good lawyer can earn in a few minutes what judges get in a month.

If this is the situation of the full-fledged courts, the plight of the tribunals and other quasi-judicial bodies is worse. Till recently, one national appellate tribunal was functioning from a car! Several tribunals have little infrastructure let alone a functional library or computer system. They function only a few hours in the morning in many places.

The state governments, which are the respondents in many cases before these forums, are not keen to provide them the basic facilities. Following the lead of the central government, the state budgets also treat the judiciary shabbily. Financial autonomy for the judiciary is still a mirage though several suggestions have been made to the Planning Commission and the Financial Commission over the past decades.

There has been occasional bickering between the executive and the judiciary over the unhappy situation. Government representatives blame the judiciary for the slow disposal of cases and corruption, which has reached the higher echelons in recent times. Judges counter this by pointing out the poor infrastructure and funds provided to the third estate. The challenge before the new government is to save the legal system from impending collapse.