Justice delayed as COVID-19 halts regular court work in West Bengal

Justice for many will be further delayed as the normal functioning of the judiciary in the state is unlikely to resume until normalisation of public transportation following a complete withdrawal of the lockdown.

It’s learnt that workers welfare association of the Calcutta High Court pointed out that many of its members and advocates avail public transportation to reach the courts and hence it will not be possible to resume full-fledged court works until adequate public transports are available.

The association reportedly conveyed its position during a meeting of the three wings of bars, comprising the Bar Association, the Bar Library Club and the Incorporated Law Society held on Wednesday (May 13) in presence of senior judges to discuss the post-lockdown scenario.

On the same day, the high court in a notification extended until May 31 the suspension of the regular functioning of all courts in the state, including the circuit benches of the high court at Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Jalpaiguri in view of the COVID-19 pandemic.

During this suspension period the court will take up for hearing only “extremely urgent matters,” registrar general of the high court Rai Chattopadhyay said. The prolonged suspension of regular court work is creating a huge backlog of pending cases. The number of pending cases in the state is around 23.03 lakh according to National Judicial Data Grid. Of the pending cases, there are about 5.14 lakh civil cases and 17.89 lakh criminal cases.
In January the number of pending cases was 22.81 lakh of which 17.7 lakh were criminal cases.

A senior advocate of the high court said there will be further piling of cases after the courts start regular works. There will be a surge in litigation as many are waiting for the court to open to file lawsuits, he said.

In the post-lockdown scenario, the case disposal rate might get slowed as the court will be forced to list fewer cases each day to avoid crowding to maintain social distance. Senior judges and members of bars reportedly discussed on Wednesday (April 13) how to prioritise cases to deal with the large backlog after the wheels of justice start moving again after the lockdown.

The functioning of the courts in the state came almost to a grinding halt from April 30 after the mother of a driver engaged in ferrying officials of the Kolkata’s Alipore court rested positive for COVID-19. Earlier, despite the lockdown, the courts were taking up some special cases.

After the incident Chief Justice TB Radhakrishnan decided to suspend the court proceedings as an emergency measure. Since then only extremely urgent matters relating to criminal, writ appeal, and civil appeal are being heard through video conferencing.

As part of the hearing of “extremely urgent matters” a two-member bench of the high court through video conferencing will hear on May 15 a public interest litigation (PIL) on the ban imposed on internet services in Hooghly district following clashes between two communities. The ban is imposed until May 17 to prevent the circulation of fake news and videos.