NEW DELHI: The Union Ministry of Law and Justice is going to study the way the courts of Gujarat are disposing of the old cases at a faster pace and treat it as a role model for other states in the country to cut down the massive pendency. According to the data of National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG), the lower courts in the state on its own disposed of 3,68,762 cases between 2015 to 2018 whereas all subordinate courts in the country could only manage to dispose of 12 lakh cases in the same time period.
The disposal rate of cases in Gujarat has been consistently high for the last four years and this is why the law ministry is going to conduct a study to understand the way the subordinate judiciary is disposing of the cases so swiftly.“We have sought a detailed report from the Gujarat High Court on the various initiatives taken by it so that the same steps can be taken at other courts across the country to ease off the burden of pendency,” said a senior ministry official.
Uttar Pradesh was the second fastest in speedy disposal by clearing 2,68,465 cases. Majority of these cases are pending for more than 10 years or so. As per the National Judicial Data Grid, there are 2.91 crore cases pending in the district and subordinate courts, out of which 21.90 lakh cases are pending for more than 10 years. Early this year, four districts of Gujarat subordinate courts had ranked amongst the top 10 courts in the country which had disposed of highest cases in March.
According to an official, initiatives like the classification of cases based on year, no adjournment, special focus on disposing cases of senior citizens and women which are pending for long have been taken to maintain the disposal pace by the subordinate courts of Gujarat.