Bombay High Court to continue with physical hearings after Chief Justice finds it smooth with no overcrowding

Chief Justice of Bombay High Court, Dipankar Datta on Friday decided that the High Court will continue with physical hearings which had commenced on December 1 noting that there has been no incident of concern with such hearings up until now. .An order issued by the Registrar General of the High Court noted that the Chief Justice after a round of inspection of physical courts on December 3 found that the hearings were smooth and seamless and without any overcrowding. ."Chief Justice along with Shri Justice Girish S. Kulkarni took a round of the High Court on December 3, 2020 while the Courts were in session and did not find any overcrowding, as alleged in some of the representations, either on the corridors or in the Bar rooms. Till date, there has been no incident of concern which would warrant discontinuation of physical hearings which have resumed on experimental basis," the order said..Hence, it was decided to continue with the physical hearings in adherence to COVID norms and protocols. The High Court had, on November 27, issued an order declaring that most benches of High Court will conduct physical hearings on experimental basis from December 1, 2020 to January 10, 2021..The decision was met with a cold response from the Bombay Bar Association (BBA) and 452 lawyers practicing in Mumbai who separately wrote to the Chief Justice on November 29 requesting that lawyers be given the option to choose between physical and virtual hearings.The representations highlighted the spike in COVID cases across the country stating that restarting physical hearings at this stage could lead to increase in transmission.BBA made the specific request to the Chief Justice seeking a modification in the office order.."One step forward, two steps back:" Lawyers write to Bombay High Court Chief Justice to reconsider physical hearing.The order issued by Registrar General on Friday, however, said that all judges of the High Court "in one voice expressed in favour of continuation of physical hearings in tune with the standard operating procedure dated November 27, 2020 till January 8.".Members of the Bar with whom the Chief Justice had the occasion to interact expressed satisfaction in regard to resumption of physical hearings in almost all Courts after months of waiting, it added. "In such view of the matter, it has been decided by the Chief Justice to continue with the SOP dated November 27, 2020 with liberty to the members of the Bar to approach each individual Bench to consider the desirability of fixing separate boards for morning and afternoon sessions to facilitate further smooth and seamless physical hearings in accordance with COVID norms and protocols," the order said..[Read Order by Registrar General]