NEW DELHI: The India Justice Report 2025, released on Tuesday, presents a detailed picture of Delhi’s judicial system. While it shows progress in gender inclusion, it also highlights major concerns like overcrowded prisons, a heavy judicial workload, and long case backlogs.
The report, prepared by Tata Trusts along with civil society organisations like the Centre for Social Justice, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, DAKSH, and Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, points out that Delhi’s district courts have one of the lowest judicial vacancy rates in the country—only 11 per cent. Even more impressive, women make up 45 per cent of judges, much higher than the national average.
However, this progress in gender representation contrasts sharply with the condition of Delhi’s prisons. The city has the highest proportion of undertrials in the country—91 per cent of the prison population. Since 2012, Delhi’s prisons have been running at over 170 per cent occupancy, and in 2022, 15 per cent of the facilities had occupancy rates above 250 per cent. Three jails have had this level of overcrowding since 2020.
Healthcare in these prisons is also very poor. There are only 90 doctors for nearly 18,000 inmates, which means one doctor for every 206 prisoners. There are serious staff shortages too—27 per cent overall, with a 60 per cent shortage of correctional staff and a 34 per cent gap in prison officers.
Even though Delhi’s district courts have a relatively strong bench, they are struggling with a huge number of pending cases. As of January 1, 2025, more than 14 lakh cases were waiting to be resolved at the district level. Shockingly, one in five of these cases has been pending for over five years, and 2 per cent for more than ten years. In 2024, each judge handled an average of 2,023 cases, up from 1,551 in 2017, though still below the national average of 2,200.
Delhi’s Case Clearance Rate (CCR) was just 78 per cent in 2024—one of the lowest in the country. The city achieved a 100 per cent CCR only once, in 2023, between 2017 and 2024.
The report also looks at policing in Delhi. As of January 2023, vacancies among constables improved to 15 per cent, down from 20 per cent the year before. However, officer-level vacancies increased from 2 per cent to 8 per cent.
On a positive note, Delhi spends the most on police training in the country—Rs 28,614 per person, and 2 per cent of the police budget goes to training, which is almost double the national average of 1.25 per cent. Women make up 15 per cent of the police force and 11 per cent of officers—both above national averages.
Also, 88 per cent of police stations are equipped with CCTVs and women’s help desks. Access to legal aid is another strong area. Delhi has the most extensive legal aid network in the country, with 99 legal aid clinics for its 103 villages—almost one clinic per village. The city also has a good gender balance in legal aid providers: 56 per cent of paralegal volunteers and 36 per cent of panel lawyers are women. In 2024, the Delhi State Legal Services Authority helped dispose of 94 per cent of pre-litigation and pending cases through Lok Adalats, the highest rate in the country.