[COVID-19] Bombay High Court to continue with virtual hearings, will sit on alternate Saturdays to clear backlog of cases

The administrative committee of the Bombay High Court has decided to continue hearing cases via video conference till end of July, 2021 in view of the COVID-19 situation in Maharashtra. .The decision was taken at a meeting of the administrative committee held on Tuesday, attended by Chief Justice Dipankar Datta, other judges and all bar associations of the High Court. The Central Task Force briefed the members in the meeting about the prevailing situation in Maharashtra and Mumbai. Relying on the available data, they suggested that for the time being, opening courts for physical hearing of cases was not advisable..In view of this, the administrative came to a conclusion that the present system of virtual hearing would continue at least till end of July, 2021. The Committee stated that all benches would continue sitting thrice a week with the working hours increased to 5.In order to clear backlog of cases, the administrative committee also decided that the benches will sit on the first and third Saturdays of each month. It was also suggested that approximately 10 benches will sit on the working Saturdays only to hear bail and anticipatory bail applications in order to clear the huge backlog of those cases.A notice to this effect with the standard operating procedure will be released shortly..The committee had previously decided to hold virtual hearings till end of June, 2021..The meeting was held today as had been indicated by CJ Datta during the hearing of batch of petitions seeking directions to the State to include lawyers and their registered clerks in the list of "essential service providers" eligible for travel relaxations amid COVID-19 pandemic.."Why can't lawyers be allowed in local trains?" Bombay High Court asks Maharashtra government to take a decision before July 1."Lawyers not being able to come to courts will increase pendency of cases, which will be so high that even a hundred judges in the High Court will not be able to reduce the pending cases," CJ Datta had expressed his concern during the hearing..The Bombay High Court had decided to revert to virtual and hybrid mode of hearing cases from April 7 except for criminal cases of extreme urgency effective.Virtual hearing continued till May 7 although physical filing of cases were permitted.Even during vacation, the Court was hearing matters through video conference and such an arrangement was scheduled to continue till June 11.