Lawyers should devote time for social issues

The consumer of justice wants unpolluted, expeditious and inexpensive justice. He is not interested in knowing the causes for delay in disposal of cases. The delay in disposal of cases is resulting in the citizen getting tempted to take law in his own hands and take recourse to extra judicial methods to settle scores and seek redress of his grievance. Delay in disposal of cases also gives rise to many other aberrations, which hit at the basic credibility of the institution.

The consumer of justice wants unpolluted, expeditious and inexpensive justice. He is not interested in knowing the causes for delay in disposal of cases.

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The delay in disposal of cases is resulting in the citizen getting tempted to take law in his own hands and take recourse to extra judicial methods to settle scores and seek redress of his grievance. Delay in disposal of cases also gives rise to many other aberrations, which hit at the basic credibility of the institution. In this materialistic world the witnesses being bought over is not an unknown factor.

Some times even truthful witnesses may forget the sequence of events due to lapse of time. It is, therefore, necessary that delay during trial of cases should be avoided. The high regard that people have for the judiciary can turn to dismay when faced with the working of the justice delivery system.

iv)Recognising the stakes of the poorer sections It has been experienced that often poor and illiterate people are unable to engage even a defence lawyer let alone a good advocate to represent them because of their poverty. They, therefore, suffer more than the 'rich' or 'powerful' accused who engage the best of talents.

The government should allocate sufficient funds and other resources to ensure that the legal services are available to the poor and the disadvantaged persons. The courts should also ensure that an accused does not remain unrepresented during the trial.

The institution of legal aid should be strengthened as it will go a long way in improving the system itself. The bar associations should also come forward to share this responsibility. The lawyers should devote some of their time to render social service by providing free legal aid. This would create a positive image of the lawyer's fraternity in the mind of the society as a whole. My experience with the bar over the years has been that they are willing to contribute their skills in this behalf-the courts need to ask them to help-their response would be very positive.

v)Rationalising the sentencing process
"Sentencing Process" also plays a crucial role in the criminal justice delivery system. The sentence being the end result of all trials culminating into a conviction, it should be commensurate with the offense committed. It must reflect the court's condemnation of the crime and response to the loud cry of the society for justice.

For certain offences, the approach should be to rehabilitate and reintegrate into the main stream of social life such offenders who have committed the offense out of compulsion or passion and are not habitual criminals so as to reclaim them as useful members of the society. The state should need to consider improving the correctional facilities to the convicts. That would be in tune with the current thinking in the field of penology.

Friends, there are laws and procedure in place to deal with the crime. The requirement is to improve the human resource and to infuse motivation in them. The actors of the criminal justice delivery system are required to have a victim-oriented approach.

There is also a necessity of a paradigm shift from convicting the offenders to the redressal of grievances and payment of compensation to the victims, wherever possible. All stakeholders like the police, the lawyers and the judges can certainly improve the existing criminal justice delivery system by putting in sincere and honest efforts-state must, however, make the environment conducive to develop a proper work culture for all the stakeholders if the criminal justice delivery system is to be reformed.
Concluded
(The writer is Chairperson, National Human Rights Commission.)