Friday, 17 May, 2024
By: Yash Gupte
As of January 31, 2023, the number of pending cases in the fast track special courts stands at 1,98,563. Image Source: IANS
In order to speed up the justice system, the Department of Justice is implementing a centrally sponsored scheme since October 2019 in pursuance to the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2018 for setting up 1023 Fast Track Special Courts (FTSCs)
The Indian Judicial System is facing a number of problems today. But the major challenges faced by the judiciary are the shortage of judges in the different High Courts in the country and the increase in number of pending cases. In order to overcome the problem of pending cases in different courts across the nation, the fast track courts came into existence. The establishment of courts for speedy justice across the nation is the responsibility of the State Governments, who do so in conjunction with the relevant High Courts based on their needs and resources.
The 14th Finance Commission (FC) had recommended the establishment of 1800 Fast Track Courts (FTCs) between 2015 and 2020 for the quick resolution of specific cases of heinous nature, civil cases involving women, children, senior citizens, disabled people, people suffering from terminal illnesses, etc., and property-related cases with more than five years' worth of backlog. In addition, the FC has advised State Governments to use the increased fiscal headroom made possible by tax devolution (32 percent to 42 percent) for this objective. The Union Government has also urged the State Governments to allocate funds for the setting up of FTCs, from the financial year 2015-16 onward.
In order to speed up the justice system, the Department of Justice is implementing a centrally sponsored scheme since October 2019 in pursuance to the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2018 for setting up 1023 Fast Track Special Courts (FTSCs) including 389 exclusive Prevention of Children against Sexual Offences (POCSO) courts to provide speedy justice to the victims of rape and POCSO Act. The Scheme, which originally had a one-year duration, has been extended through March 31, 2023. In order to extend the programme beyond March 31, 2023, the Indian Institute of Public Administration (IIPA) undertook a third-party evaluation and recommended the continuation of the scheme.
Though the establishment of the Fast Track Special Courts is a welcome step in quick disposal of cases, but have these fast track courts really led to speedy justice and are these courts really fast in nature? According to the information given by the Union Minister of Law and Justice, Kiren Rijiju in a written reply to Lok Sabha, as of January 31, 2023, the number of pending cases in the fast track special courts stands at 1,98,563. It must be observed that though the Department of Justice had targeted the establishment of 1,023 FTSCs, the figures released by the Ministry of Law and Justice tells that the total number of FTCs functional in India stands at 764.
The establishment of FTCs, which are in addition to a federally financed programme of fast-track special courts for rape and crimes involving children booked under the POCSO Act, is essentially the responsibility of the states. Rape and POCSO cases that are still pending in these FTCs have been alarmingly prevalent. In FY 2019-20, Rs. 140 Cr and in FY 2020-21, Rs.160.00 Cr and in FY 2021-22, Rs.134.56 Cr was released to States as Central Share. The Cabinet further approved the continuation of the Scheme of FTSCs for two years i.e. up to March, 2023 with a total budgetary outlay of Rs. 1,572.86 Cr. with Rs.971.70 Cr. as central share.
The chart below shows the states with highest number of pending cases in fast track special courts.
Source: Ministry of Law and Justice
Uttar Pradesh has the highest number of pending cases in the fast track courts across the state. 78,839 cases are pending in fast track special courts in Uttar Pradesh. Out of the total 15,08,842 pending cases in fast track courts in India, 1,98,563 are pending in UP’s FTSCs. This means that Uttar Pradesh accounts for around 50 percent of the pending cases in India’s fast track courts. Uttar Pradesh is followed by Bihar with 15,576 cases and Madhya Pradesh wit 12,056 cases. One of the reason behind high pendency of cases in these states is the highest number of fast track courts in these states. Uttar Pradesh has the highest number (218 out of 764) of FTSCs followed by Maharashtra and West Bengal.
Talking about the pending cases in the Supreme Court, in the year 2020, there were 64,429 pending cases. The number of pending cases increased exponentially to 96,855 in 2021 but the number dropped to 69,588 in the previous year. This indicates that the Apex Court delivered judgments in more than 25,000 cases in a single year. Coming over to the High Courts, in 2021, 56,49,068 cases were pending in 25 High Courts across the country. This number in 2022 stands at 59,78,714. An increase of more than 3 lakhs. Talking about the pendency of cases in the subordinate cases, around 4 crore cases are pending. Over 4.7 crore cases are pending in courts across different levels of the judiciary.
Numerous other factors, including i) an increase in the number of state and federal laws, (ii) an accumulation of first appeals, (iii) the continuation of ordinary civil jurisdiction in some High Courts, (iv) appeals against orders of quasi-judicial forums going to High Courts, (v) the number of revisions/appeals, (vi) frequent adjournments, and (vii) the indiscriminate use of writ jurisdiction, (viii) lack of adequate arrangement to monitor, tracking and bunching of cases for hearing, (ix) assigning work of administrative nature to the Judges, etc are the factors leading to pendency of cases. Also, one of the major problems regarding Fast Track Special Courts is the less conviction under the POCSO Act. Lack of proper investigation, insufficient evidences and witnesses, family members, victim, turning hostile etc. are some of the reasons of less conviction under POCSO Act, as per information received from the High Courts.
