Public Faith In Judiciary Eroded, Need To Research Where It Went Wrong: Supreme Court Judge
Commenting on the current state of the judiciary in India, Supreme Court judge Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka on Wednesday said that “the faith they (public) had earlier in the judiciary had eroded considerably.” He further noted the inability of the Court to provide access to justice. Justice Oka also stated that the judiciary has never applied its mind as to where it is going wrong. He then emphasised the need to conduct data-driven research and find out where the judiciary went wrong.”
Justice Oka was addressing the people in the Second Shyamala Pappu Memorial Lecture on Access to justice organised in the context of 75 years of the Indian Constitution. Supreme Court judge Justice KV Viswanathan and Supreme Court Bar Association President Adish Aggarwala were also attending the programme.
“Have always believed judges should not live in ivory towers. Have been interacting with all stakeholders and my personal view is that the judiciary has not fulfilled the common man”s expectations and rather is lagging behind. Whatever faith they had earlier has eroded considerably due to various reasons, mainly that we are not able to provide access to justice and also quality and cost of justice. We never applied our minds as to where we were going wrong. We have to find out what we should have ideally achieved,” he said.
The top court judge further said that the people are talking about only the Supreme Court or High Courts as if the district courts do not exist at all, noting the neglect towards the trial courts as a reason for failing to fulfil the obligations and people’s expectation.
On the condition of the trial courts, he said they have low judges-to-population ratio, causing hindrance to meeting justice obligations and noted the poor infrastructure in these courts. Though these courts have been for years described as lower or subordinate courts, every court is a court, Justice Oka added.
He also pointed out the rise in matrimonial cases as transfer petitions and stressed prioritising criminal court appeals. The Supreme Court judge also spoke about the importance of legal aid for those who cannot approach courts due to the lack of money.
The judge further observed that there are a large number of citizens who do not even think of approaching the courts while being subjected to injustice. This is also a challenge. Organisations have to ensure people do not keep silently suffering. The idea to say all this is to start a thinking process,” the Supreme Court Judge said.
