NEW DELHI: In a clear message, the Supreme Court has told all Chief Justices of the High Courts not to disband or dismantle the infrastructure made available for virtual hearings or insist on physical presence of lawyers.
Commending the Union government for making Rs 7000 crores in budget this year for e-Courts, the top court said the money would be used for improving the infrastructure in all the district courts also.
"HCs need to learn that technology is to be used. This is public money," a bench led by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud said.
Dealing with a matter for declaring a virtual hearing as part of fundamental rights, the bench, also comprising Justices P S Narasimha and J B Pardiwala said, "Some of the Chief Justices are doing this (not allowing virtual hearings) and we very deeply disturbed by this. What some of the Chief Justices are doing is, all the money which we have spent, they're just disbanding the technological infrastructure which we have created for virtual hearings".
"Irrespective of whether a Chief Justice is technology friendly or not, this is not how you deal with public money. You have to ensure that infrastructure is available," the bench said.
The top court also said judges cannot insist on physical presence of lawyers and must understand, "Technology is not only for pandemic. It's here to stay here for future. We'll formulate an order and pass."
The court also said its effort was to reach out to all lawyers even those working at village and taluka levels.
"Our mission is to reach out to people. Lawyers who cannot understand English, We will translate judgments for them- technology is doing that. IIT Madras is helping us," the bench said.
The bench also pointed Parliamentary committee in the matter held a meeting with the SC judges and made a strong report for budget for e courts.
The bench asked senior advocate and Bar Council of India, chairman Manan Kumar Mishra as to why he does not call a report from States Bar Council on steps to be taken to improve the use of technology for the lawyers.
"Technology should not result in exclusion and you can collect the data and place it before the court. We should not leave any part of population behind," the bench told Mishra.
The plea filed by 'All India Jurists Association', a body of 5,000 lawyers, and others, the orders issued by several High Courts for discontinuing hybrid hearings was a death knell for the idea of virtual courts.
"The order goes against accessible, and affordable justice being propagated by the e-committee of the top court," it said citing instances of Uttarakhand, Bombay, Madhya Pradesh and Kerala High Courts compelling lawyers to appear physically.
