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ShareMumbai: In a first step towards reducing the backlog of more than one crore petty cases pending in the 10 local courts of Mumbai, 100 trainee magistrates disposed of 53,159 such matters over the last five days. The government raked in nearly Rs2 crore by way of fines.
The first batch of 100 judicial magistrates, newly recruited from the Maharashtra Judicial Academy and India Mediation Centre and Training Institute, Bhayander, was given "field" experience as part of their training as special executive magistrates.
For five working days between October 29 and November 4, the magistrates handled petty cases such as driving without licence, hawking without licence, littering on the streets, etc, which attract a fine of up to Rs5,000 or simple imprisonment of up to six months. The magistrates, stationed at 10 metropolitan magistrate courts, were given a daily board of about 100 cases each. Of the 87,636 cases that came up for hearing, 53,159 were disposed of.
"This is a welcome move by the high court. Such cases can be disposed of early but the regular courts, which also deal with criminal matters, spend only an hour in a day hearing them," said Harish Shetty, president of the Borivli metropolitan magistrate court bar association.
With the "phenomenal success" of the exercise, the high court is considering continuing with the project to clear the backlog, according to a statement by the registrar-general of the high court.
