Lok Sabha Question No. 4168 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2018-03-21
Subject: Pending Court Cases
Ministry: LAW AND JUSTICE
Asked by: MANSUKHBHAI DHANJIBHAI VASAVA, SUNIL KUMAR MONDAL, RAM KUMAR SHARMA KUSHWAHA

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF LAW & JUSTICE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

## LOK SABHA

## UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 4168

TO BE ANSWERED ON WEDNESDAY, THE 21 ST     MARCH, 2018.

## Pending Court Cases

†4168. SHRI MANSUKHBHAI DHANJIBHAI VASAVA: SHRI SUNIL KUMAR MONDAL: SHRI RAM KUMAR SHARMA:

## Will the Minister of LAW AND JUSTICE be pleased to state:

- (a)  whether  cases  as  old  as  20  years  are  still  pending  in  High  Courts  and  Supreme Court of the country and if so, the facts in this regard;
- (b) the numbers of such cases which have been lying pending for more than 20 years in each of the High Courts of the country;
- (c)  whether  the  Government  has  formulated  any  action  plan  to  dispose  of  the  said cases on priority basis and if so, the details thereof;
- (d) the number of cases pending at present in Gujarat High Court and the number of cases which are pending for more than 15 years out of these;
- (e)  whether the people of Gujarat are unable to get justice due to long pendency of cases in the State and if so, the reaction of the Government thereto; and
- (f)  the number of judges working in Gujarat High Court during each of the last three years and number of the vacancies of judges in the State?

## ANSWER

## MINISTER OF STATE FOR LAW AND JUSTICE AND CORPORATE AFFAIRS (SHRI P. P. CHAUDHARY)

(a) to (e): Data on pendency of cases is maintained by the Supreme Court and High Courts. As per information available on the web-portal of National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG), details of cases pending for more than 10 years in various High Courts including Gujarat High Court are given in a Statement at Annexure .  A total of 1,09,709 cases are pending in Gujarat High Court, out of which 17,032 cases are pending for more than 10 years.

Disposal  of  cases  in  courts  is  within  the  domain  of  the  judiciary.    In  pursuance  of resolution passed in the Chief Justices' Conference held in April, 2015, 23 High Courts have set up Arrears Committees to clear the backlog of cases pending for more than five years, except Sikkim High Court where there is no pendency of more than five year old cases.  The Arrear Committees have chalked out Action Plans to reduce pendencies in their respective jurisdictions.    The Supreme Court has also constituted an Arrears Committee consisting of two  Hon'ble  Judges  to  formulate  steps  to  reduce  pendency  of  cases  in  High  Courts  and District  Courts.    At  district  level,  the  District  Judge  holds  monthly  meeting  of  all  judicial officers to monitor progress made in reduction of long pending cases.

Government  on  its  part  has  taken  several  measures  to  facilitate  early  disposal  of cases.  In order to expedite the trial of court cases, legislative changes have been made in procedural laws  which  include  provisions  for  limiting  adjournments  of  court  proceedings  in criminal  and  civil  matters  as  contained  in  Section  309  of  the  Code  of  Criminal  Procedure, 1973 and Order XVII of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908. Further, the Government has set up  a  National  Mission  for  Justice  Delivery  and  Legal  Reforms  to  achieve  twin  goals  of  (i) increasing access to justice by reducing delays and arrears; and (ii) enhancing accountability through structural changes and by setting performance standards and improving capacities. The  Mission  has  adopted  a  coordinated  approach  for  phased  liquidation  of  arrears  and pendency  in  judicial  administration  by  providing  support  for  better  court  infrastructure including computerisation, encouraging increase in the strength of subordinate judiciary and recommending policy and legislative measures in the areas prone to excessive litigation and suggesting re-engineering of court procedures for quick disposal of cases.  The challenges posed by huge backlog and pendency of cases in the judicial system cannot be met without the active involvement of judiciary. The Chief Justice of India, after consulting the Minister of Law and Justice established the National Court Management Systems (NCMS) in May, 2012. The  'Policy  and  Action  Plan'  document  to  implement  NCMS  was  released  by  the  Chief Justice  of  India  on  27.9.2012.  NCMS  is  responsible  for  preparing  a  policy  guideline  for developing a National Framework of Court Excellence (NFCE) to set measurable performance standards  for  Indian  courts  to  address  issues  of  quality,  responsiveness  and timely delivery of justice.  All High Courts have constituted State Court Management System (SCMS) to do similar exercise at the State Level.  The Minister of State for Law and Justice vide letter  dated  7 th February  2017,  addressed  the  Chief  Justices  of  all  the  High  Courts requesting them to speed up the process of implementation of e-Court Project for actualising the objectives of the Project.  The number of computerised District and Subordinate Courts in the country has increased from 13,672 to 16,089.  The Department of Justice has requested Chief  Secretaries  of  all  State  Governments  to  utilise  the  various  tools  available  like  the National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG) database, accessible through http://njdg.ecourts.gov.in/njdg/index.php.  The NJDG's query builder and management tools functionality  enables culling out of information and reports on Act wise, Litigant wise, Date wise,  City  wise,  District  wise,  Court  Establishment/  Court  wise  and  Judge  wise  legal pendency in both civil  and  criminal  matters.    This  can  be  used  to  look  into  state  and  /  or department specific pendencies and  enable steps to be taken at the governments' end to reduce such pendencies.

- (f): As per available information, 28, 31 and 31 Judges were working in Gujarat High Court at the end of the calendar years 2015, 2016 and 2017 respectively.

In so far as the District and Subordinate Courts in Gujarat are concerned, the information (as provided by the Gujarat High Court) as on 28.02.2018 is as follows:

Sanctioned Strength   :  1496

Working strength         :  1116

Vacancies                    :    380

## Statement referred to in reply to Lok Sabha Unstarred Question No.4168 dated 21.03.2018 Pending Cases in various High Courts for more than 10 years

| S. No.                                                            | High Court Name                                                   | Total     |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------------|-----------|
| 1.                                                                | Allahabad High Court                                              | 2,67,713  |
| 2.                                                                | High Court of Bombay                                              | 1,45,425  |
| 3.                                                                | High Court of Punjab and Haryana                                  | 1,08,807  |
| 4.                                                                | Calcutta High Court                                               | 93,251    |
| 5.                                                                | High Court of Rajasthan                                           | 70,412    |
| 6.                                                                | High Court of Madhya Pradesh                                      | 65,681    |
| 7.                                                                | Telangana and Andhra Pradesh High Court                           | 51,585    |
| 8.                                                                | Madras High Court                                                 | 51,044    |
| 9.                                                                | Orissa High Court                                                 | 39,464    |
| 10.                                                               | Patna High Court                                                  | 23,736    |
| 11.                                                               | High Court of Kerala                                              | 20,218    |
| 12.                                                               | High Court of Gujarat                                             | 17,032    |
| 13.                                                               | High Court of Jharkhand                                           | 15,413    |
| 14.                                                               | High Court of Jammu and Kashmir                                   | 9,344     |
| 15.                                                               | High Court of Delhi                                               | 8,880     |
| 16.                                                               | High Court of Chhattisgarh                                        | 7,011     |
| 17.                                                               | High Court of Uttarakhand                                         | 6,422     |
| 18.                                                               | High Court of Karnataka                                           | 6,288     |
| 19.                                                               | High Court of Manipur                                             | 4,524     |
| 20.                                                               | High Court of Himachal Pradesh                                    | 1,814     |
| 21.                                                               | Gauhati High Court                                                | 286       |
| 22.                                                               | High Court of Tripura                                             | 3         |
| 23.                                                               | High Court of Meghalaya                                           | 1         |
| Total Cases pending in various High Courts for more than 10 Years | Total Cases pending in various High Courts for more than 10 Years | 10,14,354 |

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