Judges should take leaves in staggered manner to avoid complete shut down of courts during vacation: Parliamentary Committee

Judges should take their leave at different times through the year so that courts are constantly open and there are always benches present to hear cases, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice has suggested..The Committee chaired by Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament, Sushil Kumar Modi presented its 133rd report on 'Judicial processes and their reforms' to both the houses of the parliament on Monday..The report said that most members felt that the need of the hour is an "efficient judiciary that is not only committed to meeting the needs and interests of the citizens but also communicates this commitment by modifying its practices to suit the needs of the country."The Committee, therefore, said that the judiciary needs to be sensitized so that it refrains from shutting down courts en masse for a couple of months a year..As per the information provided by the Supreme Court of India to the government, during the last three years, the average number of court working days of the Supreme Court were 224 (2019), 217 (2020), and 202 (2021) days..In written submissions before the Committee, the Department of Justice had informed that it had previously examined the question of increasing the number of working days in Courts in 2002-03. To tackle the issue of extensive pending cases in High Courts, the Department had requested that all High Courts consider adjusting their vacation periods in a manner that ensures that the High Courts maintain a minimum of 222 working days in a year.As per the information available with the government, the current average number of working days in High Courts stands at 210 days.The Department of Justice noted that the practice of court vacations, particularly the extended summer vacations spanning 7 weeks (10 weeks prior to 2013), has been a customary tradition dating back to colonial times.The Department suggested that a comprehensive review of the vacation schedules for both the Supreme Court and High Courts is warranted. .The Committee, in its analysis, found that the Supreme Court has the highest case load among apex courts around the world, although it also works the most. In terms of the number of judgments delivered as well, with 34 judges, the Supreme Court of India is way ahead of others, the Committee found.A committee also formulated a comparative statement of working days of apex courts of some democratic countries during the calendar year 2020, compiled from the available calendars of the respective countries..Three lawyers on the committee expressed their opinions on the issue as well. According to Senior Advocate Vivek Tankha, vacations came as a concept from the British days, when the British would go back to England to enjoy their holidays.His case was that there can be no such vacation for the High Court or the Supreme Court now. Judges can be on vacation; staff can be on vacation; but a sovereign body does not go on vacation.Hence, he suggested that judges should take leaves in a staggered manner to bring back about 100 days to court's working days."And, if 100 days come back as court’s working days, see the number of cases that would also get addressed and decided," he said..On the contrary, Senior Advocates P Wilson and Mahesh Jethmalani were of the view that in a profession that demands intellectual rigor and long working hours, vacations are much needed for rejuvenation for both lawyers as well as judges."Very few professions have such a constant level of stress on an everyday basis as lawyers and judges experience. Therefore, it would not be prudent to extend Court hours or reduce Court vacation days," said Wilson."There is high amount of litigation. Please don't blame the judiciary for this. We have the most litigious population in the whole world and we have the lowest number of judges per litigant. We need more judges. Reducing holidays will cure everything will never be the answer," said Jethmalani.Jethmalani also underlined that the Supreme Court was doing a very good job. With respect to pendency in High Courts, he said that holidays could be an issue but that this could also be attributed to low bench strengths or a lack of candidates for the bench."It may be simplistic thing to take away holidays and expect that litigation or arrears will go away. There are other reasons," he added..The Committee further noted that as on December 31, 2022, overall vacancies in High Courts stood at 30% of the sanctioned strength and many of them had vacancies ranging from 40-50%. Thus, it concluded that vacations are not the only cause of high pendency of cases in the higher judiciary.It opined that to reduce case pendency, a multipronged strategy is required. "However, at the same time, it is an undeniable fact that vacations in the judiciary are a 'colonial legacy' and with entire court going on vacation en mass causes deep inconvenience to the litigants," it added. In this scenario, the Committee took the view that the suggestion of the former Chief Justice of India (CJI) RM Lodha on court vacations should be considered by the judiciary. The former CJI had suggested that instead of all the judges going on vacation all at one time, individual judges should take their leave at different times through the year so that the courts are constantly open and there are always benches present to hear cases..[Read Report]