Nearly four crore cases are pending in lower and subordinate courts with over one lakh cases awaiting justice for more than thirty years, the government told Lok Sabha on Thursday.
“As per the information available on National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG), as on 30.07.2021 a total of 3,93,21,607 cases are pending in the lower and subordinate courts,” Law Minister Kiren Rijiju told the Lok Sabha in a written reply.
While a bulk of the cases are up to three years old, 1,20,001 (0.26 per cent) have been pending for more than 30 years, he said.
“No time frame has been prescribed for disposal of various kinds of cases by the respective courts,” the Law Minister said.
Of the 3.93 crore cases that are pending, 2.88 crore are criminal cases, while 1.05 crore are civil cases.
As per the information tabled by the government, 1,17,08,278, 29.78 per cent of the 3.93 crore cases have been pending for a year, 1,19,31,641 (30.34 per cent) have been awaiting justice for three years.
As many as 62,88,783 (15.99 per cent) cases are pending for three to five years, 60,85,363 (15.48 per cent) are in courts for five to 10 years.
As many as 27,17,796 (6.91 per cent) cases are pending between 10-20 years, another 4,87,745 (1.24 per cent) have been waiting to hear the final gavel between 20 to 30 years.
Rjiju said the government has been working to provide better infrastructure for courts, including computerisation, increase in the strength of subordinate judiciary and re-engineering of court procedure for quick disposal of cases.
“The number of court halls has increased from 15,818 as on 30.06.2014 to 20,218 as on 22.07.2021 and the number of residential units has increased from 10,211 as on 30.06.2014 to 17,815 as on 22.07.2021,” he said.
(Published 05 August 2021, 16:40 IST)
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