Shimla: Chief Justice of India Justice T S Thakur on Friday stressed the need to fill the vacant post of judges to clear the pendency of cases and said that in case the vacancies are not filled, it becomes a challenge to clear the backlog of cases.
“It becomes a national challenge for the Judiciary to clear backlog at the earliest in the High Courts where the vacancies of judges are more and required to be filled,” he said while addressing a gathering after laying the foundation of National Law university and inaugurating the Hostel block of HP Judicial Legal academy at Ghandal, 15 km from here.
Referring to the vacancies of Judges in High Courts, the Chief Justice said that “It is an inexorable process as the studies show that instance of cases was directly related to literacy and prosperity.”
“People now are quite literate and conscious of their rights and seek shelter of the courts even for their petty grievances,” he remarked.
Though the pendency in the Himachal Pradesh High Court has reduced by 50 per cent, which is commendable performance, Thakur said that he did not hear about any such reduction in other High courts .
He said that 80 per cent of backlog was mainly in eight states including UP, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka and observed that the burden of backlog of cases brings the entire judicial system at halt.
Praising the Himachal and Kerala High Courts for clearance of backlog, Thakur said that the reason for this was that the number of vacancies in these High Courts was quite less.