In February, the Lok Adalat cleared more than 9.43 lakh cases across the country. However, Justice Gogoi submitted that if one looked at the country's population of 1.3 billion, the numbers were just a "drop in the ocean."
Supreme Court judge Justice Ranjan Gogoi observed that though the number of cases resolved by the Lok Adalat was impressive in isolation, the numbers were dismal in comparison with the general population of the country.
In February, the Lok Adalat cleared more than 9.43 lakh cases across the country. However, Justice Gogoi submitted that if one looked at the country's population of 1.3 billion, the numbers were just a "drop in the ocean."
"The budgetary allocation for judicial services has been a constant 0.04 per cent," Justice Gogoi said while delivering an address on the concluding day of the two-day 15th All India State Legal Services meet up in the national capital. Accordingly, the judiciary's impact was akin to the same, he observed.
Justice Gogoi further submitted that a proactive approach to use of funds, otherwise largely unutilised, would go a long way in clearing the dock of accumulating cases.
The two-day meet-up saw member secretaries from almost all state legal service authorities catch up with each other and participate in finding a way to making access to the judicial system easier for the general public.
The observations made by various justices who spoke at the dais were largely in tune with each other when they said that though funds were available, there was a severe lack of quality legal aid.
Various member secretaries from different states who had gathered, agreed with the predominant observation that quality legal services were sorely lacking. Several member secretaries who spoke to DNA, concurred, saying that quality lawyers and paralegal volunteers were sorely lacking.
"We don't need money. We need more courts, judicial officers and staff," said Budi Habung, Member Secretary, Arunachal Pradesh State Legal Service Authorities. Whereas Rajnish Srivastava, Member Secretary, Chattisgarh State Legal Service Authorities said quality paralegal volunteers were badly needed. "Our main concern is to get bail for tribals accused of being Naxalites. Here illiteracy is so high, that tribals cannot even comprehend the charges levelled against them," Srivastava added.
Though indigenous problems in each state may differ, the process to tackle them are sorely missing.
Justicespeak
Justice Dipak Misra, who spoke on both the days, used Walt Whitman's poem 'O Captian! My Captain' to illustrate the point that legal service authorities had a greater duty to the general public. On Saturday, when Justice Misra first spoke, he reminded law officers that legal aid was not charity and that lawyers should work sincerely.
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