On an average, 25,000 public interest litigations are filed in the Supreme Court and High Courts in the country every year, in which departments of the Central and State Governments are parties. But they try to avoid participating in the court process. When the decision comes, the legislature and the executive delay the compliance of the order. It is heartening that the Supreme Court has now started the process of making available translations of judicial decisions in regional languages including Hindi. 1091 judgments of the apex court were made available in regional languages on Republic Day. The judgments of the apex court will now be available on the National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG) portal including website, mobile app.

In 2010, on the advice of the Supreme Court, the Union Law Ministry took steps to connect all courts in the country with e-technology, establish a judicial grid, transfer files and data from one court to another, record statements of parties and witnesses through video conference, A comprehensive blueprint of this scheme was prepared for the purposes of hearing process without bringing the criminal to the court, making a copy of the order available to the parties online in each court. In the last twelve years, one thousand seven hundred crore rupees have been spent on this scheme.

With this launch on Republic Day, the parties and the common citizens of the country have been able to read the orders themselves. The biggest difficulty faced by the litigants was when they were unable to read the orders written in English language of Supreme and High Courts due to ignorance of the language. Hindi is the language of communication of the majority of the countrymen.

But the Supreme Court and the High Courts have made English their language. In 2015, the Union Home Ministry filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court to write the judgments of the courts in Hindi. But then the Supreme Court rejected it as the difficulty of the judges. Although even now the decisions may not be written in the regional language including Hindi, but the availability of translation will also be a big relief.

Although the judgments in the lower courts of Hindi states are written in Hindi, but the Hindi language of legal use is so complex that it is difficult for the parties to understand it. The Indian Penal Code (IPC) made in the year 1860 is full of Urdu, Arabic, Persian words, which are difficult for Hindi speaking people to understand. Language reform is needed here too. State governments can also direct it.

Talking about the speed of justice in the courts of the country, the situation in the civil courts is such that three generations pass till the final justice is delivered, but proper justice is not delivered. Even the country's top jurists repeat sentences like 'justice delayed equals injustice' from public forums. But the reality is that the common citizen of India considers the judicial system of the country to be a heel rubbing system.

The inaction and lack of co-ordination of various branches of the executive in more than fifty percent pending cases in the country compels the common man to approach the court. Central and state governments are unable to implement the decisions of the courts for years. The number of judges in the courts is also very less as compared to the pendency of cases. There are only twenty judges per one million population of the country. But governments are not giving priority to increase the number of judges.

Even today, not only do the common people of the country climb the door of justice out of fear, but in the process they are also harassed in many ways. Date after date goes on and to know the next date he has to pay even money to babus and lawyers. On the basis of poor, women and caste concession, the government has established legal service authorities in the courts for legal aid, but the functioning of these institutions is limited to mere formality.

On an average, 25,000 public interest litigations are filed in the Supreme Court and High Courts in the country every year, in which departments of the Central and State Governments are parties. But they try to avoid participating in the court process. When the decision comes, the legislature and the executive delay the compliance of the order. As a responsibility of the executive, Section 41A of the Indian Penal Code prohibits the local police from arresting a person accused of an offense punishable by less than seven years and producing him directly in court.

Under this, the police have the right to take a decision after full deliberation to see whether the category of crime is eligible to register an FIR or not. But the police of the states not only strictly arrest the accused person without such deliberation, but also present the accused in the lower court with the demand of jail warrant. Every year in India seventy five lakh accused are sent to jail by presenting them directly in the court, out of which eighty percent of the cases are determined on the basis of the allegations of the plaintiff side, without any in-depth police investigation.

It is clear from a survey that in the cases under consideration, 60 percent of the accused are acquitted with honour. The lack of coordination between the police and the courts is not only responsible for this judicial burden, but is also responsible for jailing and legal harassment of the innocent. Courts are not burdened, so various judicial and appellate tribunals like Electricity, Armed Forces, Central Administrative Commission, Company Law Board, Competition Commission of India, Customs, Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, Intellectual Property, National Green Tribunal, Securities and Regulatory Board of India, Efforts were made to provide accessible justice to the common man by setting up the Information Commission, the Consumer Commission.

But since the legislature has the right to appoint the president and members in these institutions, the central and state governments are doing the appointment process in these institutions as per their convenience. This delays the judicial process. The waiting party is forced to approach civil courts instead of these judicial institutions to seek justice. Recently, while hearing a PIL on non-hearing of tribunals due to vacancies for a long time, the Supreme Court sternly warned the governments to make appointments immediately. But still most of the organizations still remain postless.

Over the years, fast-track courts have been set up in many states for the purpose of speedy disposal of rape cases and punishment for the culprits, in the rarest of rare cases, the lower courts have given harsh sentences including death sentence within the time limit. But now these decisions are under consideration of the appellate high courts. Fast track courts are limited to lower courts only.

The Supreme Court has failed to make speedy arrangements in the higher courts. In such a situation, there is a question that the establishment of fast track courts has only tried to popularize the decisions of the lower courts, but has been put in the process of waiting for final justice. Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, which deals with limited legal process like check bounce, has more than thirty-three lakh fifty thousand cases pending in the courts of the country, many of which are languishing for the last five years.

The delay in the judicial process is well known to the Chief Justice, the Chief Ministers of the States including the Prime Minister and the Judges of the High Courts. Its reasons and remedies are also available. Comprehensive reform is needed just by establishing harmony.

Source: Jansatta