Inessential litigations & State

Reportedly, there are number of court cases pending against the State which by nature , consequence or time factor, have attained the status of in-fructuousness. Government departments must , as a matter of routine, keep  the Legal department  abreast of the details of which of such cases needed  to be weeded out to save time, money and aimless follow up . Department of Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs, over 10 months back had constituted a committee which could consider such cases on merits. The Law Minister has personally issued directives in this regard to all Administrative Secretaries , not once but many times  but still there appears to be no headway achieved  in the matter. If available data is any indication of which way the directions have gone , not a single case has been received by the said committee so far for review which speaks volumes about the casual approaches not being given a go by.
Litigation is an issue which by itself assumes much importance and cannot be taken lightly but followed in the respective courts to reach decisive stages in the absence of which even those of inconsequential nature, keep on adding to the pendency list putting avoidable burden on the State .The trend needs to be reversed at the earliest. The thumb rule must be “Win good and sustainable cases” and those of frivolous or unsustainable nature must not be unnecessarily pursued.
The cases on individual cases must be scrutinized at the initial stage of filing with full transparency as also at the stage of contesting  or defending . There are cases where vacation of interim directions of the courts must be vigorously followed which otherwise has effect of stalling developmental works. There are cases which could be settled easily at the administrative levels well within the respective discretionary and administrative powers of the departmental heads and hence such cases could be persuaded to be withdrawn from the courts. What all is needed is the concerted initiative from each and every department from where such court cases, as a last resort, have been filed against the State.

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