Measures needed to reduce judicial backlog:

♤ Annual targets and action plans must be fixed for the judicial officers to dispose of old cases where accused is in custody for over two years.

♤ Quarterly review of judicial officers’ performance to curb malpractices like hasty

disposal which undermined the quality of justice dispensed, must be made.

♤ Expeditiously filling vacant posts, improving Court infrastructure and setting standards of judicial recruitment examinations are other measures to improve the quality of district judges.

♤ Further perceptions of irregularities in judge selection deserve consideration; in this context the National District Judge Recruitment Examination mooted by the Supreme Court must be given a serious thought.

♤ Incremental measures like restricting adjournments, curbing summer vacations, and audio-visual recording of court proceedings along with real-time data monitoring of case status will produce a transformative effect.

♤ Case Flow Management (CFM) rules can be incorporated by looking into the recommendations of committees formed by the Supreme Court such as the Justice

M. Jagganatha Rao committee.

♤ Encouraging Alternate Dispute Redressal Mechanisms such as Arbitration, Mediation, Conciliation and Lok Adalats along with fast track courts.

♤ Separation of traffic cases from ordinary courts.

♤ Improve the quality of subordinate judges, at the level of recruitment as well as on the job training.

♤ Implement the concept of evening courts where the services of the retired judges may be taken along with the law graduates. It would be beneficial in two ways: help training the young incumbents and reducing the pendency.

To conclude, other states should follow the footsteps of Haryana, Chandigarh, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh and Kerala where cases pending over 10 years have been reduced to 1% of the total pendency. In addition the recommendations of the 245th Law Commission Report on “Arrears and Backlogs: Creating Additional Judicial Womanpower must be implemented.