HC settled 83,554 cases in two years

Spending less than five minutes on an average on each case, the Delhi High Court disposed of nearly 83,554 cases in 2010-12, bringing down the pendency in the court by 5.14%. Harish V Nair reports.

Spending less than five minutes on an average on each case, the Delhi High Court disposed of nearly 83,554 cases in 2010-12, bringing down the pendency in the court by 5.14%.

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“The number of disposals is more than the fresh cases that were filed in these two years, the number of which is pegged at 78,027. This is apart from the 1,52,958 minor applications disposed of during the period against the 1,59,685 fresh applications filed,” said Justice S Ravindra Bhat, chairman of the committee that prepared the court’s 2010-12 report released on Thursday.

The backlog in the court as on March 31, 2012 stood at 63, 012 cases as against 69,539 on April 1, 2010.

While India is facing an unprecedented litigation explosion with about three crore cases pending in various courts across the country including the Supreme Court, the Delhi High Court is the only court that has managed to bring down the pendency levels.

The average expense incurred per minute for each case was Rs 14,771. The total expenditure in the year 2011-12 for dispensing justice was Rs 99,24,18,036.Releasing the report, Chief Justice D Murugesan said: “Contrary to public perception, every judge works much beyond the court hours, going through files, referring to law books and precedents. They also take work home. Otherwise, the court would not have been able to achieve this disposal rate”.

Releasing a report three years ago, then chief justice AP Shah had said Delhi HC was so badly stuck in arrears that “it would take 466 years to clear the gigantic backlog”.

Average disposal of cases per judge rose from 1011 in 2010-11 to 1280 in 2011-12. Each bench heard 65 cases on an average per day.