NEW DELHI: The Narendra Modi government is pushing judicial reforms with law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad writing letters to the chief justices of 24 high courts for the second time in four months, seeking their proactive approach in filling up vacancies.
Expressing the government’s concern in a communication sent last week, Prasad said at present there are 22.5% of judges’ positions are vacant in subordinate judiciary. The situation is worse in high courts where vacancies are more than 34%. The current strength of subordinate judiciary is 15,115 as against the sanctioned strength of 19,518. Similarly, as against over 900 positions in the HCs, at least 300 positions of judges are vacant.
“The government has taken up the cause, however, the working strength of judges has not kept pace with the increased sanctioned strength,” Prasad said in his letter and sought the CJs’ cooperation to expedite the recruitment process.
To bring down the pendency of cases, the government had last year increased the sanctioned strength in subordinate judiciary by 10% and in high courts by 25%, and simultaneously added hundreds of new courtrooms.
“In June this year, I had addressed separate letters to chief justices of the HCs and chief ministers of the states stressing on the need for early filling up of vacant judicial position and operationalisation of all sanctioned courts to reduce the pendency and backlog of cases,” he wrote in his letter.
The department of justice has been in touch with high courts to ascertain the causes which lead to delays in the recruitment process and has accordingly prepared “actionable points” in expediting the process of filling up vacancies.
Prasad said availability of adequate number of judges and judicial infrastructure can contribute significantly to the resolution of the problem of pendency in the judicial system.
In May this year, the law ministry had sought the views of the HCs on the bottlenecks which hamper the recruitment process of judges in district and subordinate courts resulting in significant number of judicial positions remaining unfilled at various levels. Based on the responses from the HCs, actionable points were prepared to streamline the recruitment.
Some of the HCs had told the government about the difficulties they face in finding suitable candidates as many are not able to clear the written examination for appointment at various levels in the subordinate judiciary.
The Centre has suggested that this issue can be addressed by initiating appropriate dialogue with the institutions imparting legal education and training. “These institutions may be provided necessary inputs to improve the standard of legal education so that they are in a position to impart necessary skills and knowledge to the students who are desirous of taking up judicial assignments,” a source said.
The law ministry has also submitted a proposal to the 14th Finance Commission seeking a grant of Rs 9,500 crore for development of additional court infrastructure and setting up of fast track courts, up and above what has been proposed through the previous grants.
Through the grant, the government proposes to fund setting up of 1,800 fast track courts, 450 family courts and providing Rs 50 lakh per court for creating litigant-friendly facilities such as development of waiting rooms, disabled-friendly infrastructure and witness rooms.
Contact Lawyers In India : https://lawintellectindia.com/contact-us/