India gets its first fully paperless district court in Kerala's Wayanad

Kerala's Kalpetta in Wayanad becomes India's first fully paperless district court, using AI tools and digital records to deliver faster, greener and more accessible justice

The judicial district of Kalpetta in Kerala’s Wayanad has marked a first for India by transitioning entirely to a paperless district court system, with all courts under its jurisdiction now functioning exclusively in digital mode.

 

Every stage of a case, from institution and pre-trial proceedings to evidence recording, interim applications, and final adjudication, is conducted electronically. This has eliminated the need for physical files.

 

The integration of artificial intelligence (AI)-based judicial assistance tools into the district court management framework has accompanied the shift.

 

These tools are designed to generate structured summaries from electronic case records, enabling judges to quickly grasp the factual matrix and procedural history of matters before them. 

 

 

Judicial officers can also interact with the system through question-and-answer features to retrieve case-specific information, while recording notes, marking statutory provisions and annotating documents directly on the digital file.

 

Voice-to-text technology has been deployed to ensure accurate transcription of witness depositions and judicial dictation.

 

Orders and judgments issued by the courts are authenticated using secure digital signatures, granting them full legal validity while ensuring integrity and authenticity.

 

Significantly, the entire system has been developed in-house by the Kerala High Court, without reliance on external proprietary platforms.

 

The initiative was formally announced at an event held at the high court on January 6. Chief Justice of India (CJI) Justice Surya Kant inaugurated the paperless court virtually.  

 

Addressing the gathering, the CJI described the launch in Wayanad as symbolically important, noting the district’s ecological sensitivity within the Western Ghats.

 

He characterised the move as an expression of “green jurisprudence” and a decisive step towards democratising access to justice.

 

With digital records becoming the single, authoritative source of court proceedings, access no longer depends on physical proximity to files or the volume of paperwork, he said.

 

Justice Vikram Nath, chairperson of the Supreme Court’s E-Committee, observed that the Kalpetta experiment demonstrates that complete digitisation at the district judiciary level is both feasible and scalable.

 

He described the initiative as an early but powerful example of how tradition and innovation can coexist in the justice delivery system.

 

Kerala High Court Chief Justice Justice Nitin Jamdar highlighted the tangible benefits of the paperless transition for all stakeholders, including judges, court staff, lawyers, clerks and litigants.

 

Electronic filing, he said, reduces the need for repeated visits to court offices, minimises clerical delays caused by misplaced files, lowers costs for litigants and enables faster communication of court orders.

 

Justice A K Jayasankaran Nambiar emphasised that developing AI tools internally had addressed a major concern associated with artificial intelligence, that is, the reliability of source data. By using data already captured within the district court management system, the initiative avoids the pitfalls of unreliable training datasets and dependence on third-party vendors.

 

In his opening remarks, Justice Raja Vijayaraghavan V said the transformation was achieved through sustained consultation and cooperation with all stakeholders. Feedback received so far, he added, indicated that the benefits of the system were already evident, even as minor issues were being addressed.

 

Representatives of the Bar, including the Bar Council of Kerala and the Kerala High Court Advocates’ Association, assured continued cooperation to support further digitisation across the State. Reflecting on the broader significance of the initiative, Kerala Advocate General K Gopalakrishna Kurup described the launch as representing the “real Kerala story”, highlighting the State’s commitment to innovation, sustainability and institutional reform.

 

State Law Minister P Rajeev said that while the judiciary had taken a major step forward, it was the government’s responsibility to ensure that citizens were equipped to benefit from such digital transformation. He underscored Kerala’s efforts in digital literacy and access to the internet as foundational to making paperless justice a practical reality. 

Inside the digital court

• All stages of court proceedings, from filing to final orders, now handled entirely digitally
• In-house AI tools help judges generate case summaries, retrieve information and record depositions using voice-to-text
• Court orders and judgments authenticated through secure digital signatures