Time and again, concern has been expressed from many quarters , chiefly litigants that piling up of cases for years together for hearing and pronouncing verdicts/ decisions needed resolution . This pendency of cases was surging day by day instead of showing any improvement which, without mincing any words was slowly eroding the trust in the system of dispensation of justice as justice delayed meant justice denied. There are statistics that in High Courts , each Judge of the High Court had as many as 4500 pending cases on an average .These figures have been furnished by the Law Ministry which puts nearly 1300 cases pending with each judge in subordinate judiciary as well.
The average cases pending with each judge were on the basis of sanctioned strength , going by the number of cases pending in High and lower courts. National Judicial Data Grid furnishes the Data as at the end of 2018 as 2.98 crore cases pending with district and subordinate courts . In 24 High Courts 47.68 lac cases were pending, definitely a cause of alarm.
While recruitment of judicial officers and filing up of the vacancies of the judicial officers by the Chief Justices of the High Courts was required for augmenting the strength of the lower judiciary , the same exercise needed for the High Courts as well to fill the vacancies, if any but the main reasons of the pendency must be sincerely found out and remedies sought. Summer and even winter vacations, a tradition of the British in courts, needed a review in changed conditions and availability of better facilities in court rooms and ambience . Working an extra hour or so each day plus speedy investigations, producing timely supporting documents /witnesses etc by the prosecution would go a long way in reducing the pendency of cases in courts.
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