Supreme Court creates special bench to handle trial court worries

Determined to bring down the backlog of cases by arming the subordinate judiciary with necessary tools to speed up dispensation, chief justice of India (CJI) SH Kapadia has decided to set up a special bench to monitor and address the problems being faced by trial courts.

Every Monday, this bench will call for reports from the chief secretaries of the states and registrars of high courts. The special bench would function on the lines of the forest bench, which holds environment and forest-related matters on Friday.

“If you give me all the data and problems [regarding proper infrastructure], then we would try it,” Kapadia said while giving liberty to any person, including lawyers and the bar association, to approach the bench. The court will also have an amicus curiae to assist the court.

“I would call the chief secretary of the state [in particular] and the registrar of the high court to know the status of funding for infrastructure, among other things,’’ Kapadia said during the hearing of a long-pending petition related to the setting up of consumer forum at the district level.

In another important announcement, CJI said matters which have been listed for hearing by the constitution bench twice a week would now be listed on the five working days.

Kapadia also expected meaningful cooperation from lawyers to tackle the backlog of cases which has touched 3.5 crore.

During the annual conference of chief justices and chief ministers, it had been resolved  that the judiciary must be given financial autonomy to manage its functioning without getting involved in procedural,  time consuming bureaucratic rigmarole.