Reasons

The reasons for the establishment of Permanent Lok Adalats are as follows:

1. The Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987 was enacted to constitute legal services authorities for providing free and competent legal services to the weaker sections of the society to ensure that opportunities for securing justice were not denied to any citizen by reason of economic or other disabilities and to organise Lok Adalats to ensure that the operation of the legal system promotes justice on a basis of equal opportunity.

2. The system of Lok Adalat, which is an innovative mechanism for alternate dispute resolution, has proved effective for resolving disputes in a spirit of conciliation outside the courts.

3. However, the major drawback in the existing scheme of organization of the Lok Adalats under the said Act is that the system of Lok Adalats is mainly based on compromise or settlement between the parties. If the parties do not arrive at any compromise or settlement, the case is either returned to the court of law or the parties are advised to seek remedy in a court of law. This causes unnecessary delay in the dispensation of justice. If Lok Adalats are given power to decide the cases on merits in case parties fails to arrive at any compromise or settlement, this problem can be tackled to a great extent.

4. Further, the cases which arise in relation to public utility services

such as Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited, Delhi Vidyut Board, etc., need to be settled urgently so that people get justice without delay even at pre-litigation stage and thus most of the petty cases which ought not to go in the regular courts would be settled at the pre-litigation stage itself which would result in reducing the workload of the regular courts to a great extent.

5. It is, therefore, proposed to amend the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987 to set up Permanent Lok Adalats for

providing compulsory pre-litigative mechanism for conciliation and settlement of cases relating to public utility services.