Judiciary has failed to live up to people's expectations: Former Supreme Court Justice AS Oka

Former Supreme Court Justice AS Oka on Monday said the Indian judiciary has not been able to live up to what citizens expected of it under the Constitution.

He said that the system’s self‑praise often overlooks how ordinary litigants actually experience courts.

“The common man, the citizens of India had great expectations from this legal system, but somehow all those expectations could not be fulfilled by our judiciary,” he said.

Justice Oka added,

“If somebody is to say that the common man has great faith in the judiciary, it should be said by persons who are outside the system of judiciary, not the lawyers or the judges."

He was speaking at the 45th JP Memorial Lecture organised by the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL)

The former judge underlined that the Constitution of India guarantees justice, social, economic and political and said this promise can never be realised unless courts can deliver quality and expeditious justice.

A large part of his lecture focused on personal liberty under Article 21 of the Constitution. He said that liberty issues include not only bail and pre‑trial incarceration but also environmental harm and demolition drives. 

He opined that environmental cases are also liberty cases because the right to have a pollution‑free atmosphere is a right under Article 21.

Even large‑scale cutting of mangroves becomes a liberty issue because we do not know how devastating the effect will be 6 years or 10 years later, he warned.

The former judge also flagged the judge‑population ratio and poor judicial infrastructure as key concerns in India. 

He recalled that a 2002 Supreme Court order had directed that the judge‑population ratio should reach 50 judges per million within five years.

“But today we are struggling at 22 or 23, while some developed countries have ratios of 80–90 or more per million,” he said. 

As chairperson of a court‑appointed committee, Justice Oka said the panel made an estimate that Maharashtra alone required about 8,500 trial court judges. 

“Around 8,000 posts have been sanctioned but not fully backed by the court infrastructure. We need good infrastructure. It is the government’s obligation to provide infrastructure to the court,” he said.

He further highlighted the issue of avoidable litigation. For instance, in a typical Mumbai magistrate's court, 100 to 150 cases are heard daily.

A significant portion of this workload, notably 30–40 per cent, comprises cases related to cheque-bouncing under Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act, along with other criminal, matrimonial and domestic violence matters. 

Justice Oka also connected the living conditions of slum dwellers to the protection under Article 21, emphasising the lack of affordable housing in cities.

He noted that individuals who have come to Mumbai and cannot afford legal accommodation are forced to reside in illegally built slums, often paying exorbitant rent. This has become a significant source of litigation, he observed.

Despite the sharp critique, Justice Oka said there are still judgments that give hope.

The focus should be on identifying the genuine causes of systemic failure and determining exactly where improvements are needed in the judiciary, he suggested.