SC lawyers body urges for resuming physical court hearings

A Supreme Court lawyers' body on Tuesday (June 2) asked the Chief Justice of India to resume physical court hearings upon re-opening in July 2020 after summer vacations, saying almost 95% advocates were not comfortable with the virtual court hearings.

In a representation, SC Advocates-on-Record Association President Shivaji M Jadhav suggested a slew of measures such as allowing only the limited number of lawyers per matter, restricted entry of litigants, interns and law students, mandatory sanitisation of hands of every entrant, compulsory wearing of masks by all lawyers, separate entry-exit doors and splitting of matters in two slots of pre and post-lunch for the purpose.

Appreciating e-filing module including allowing online filing of matters, scrutiny, curing of defects, etc 24x7, he said the common feedback seemed to be that the lawyers were unable to present their cases effectively in the virtual medium, which was acting as a major deterrent for lawyers to consent for such virtual hearings.

In a matter involving several parties and appearances by many lawyers, not all lawyers are given a chance to speak and sometimes, their mics were put on mute by the coordinator as a result of which, their matters got heard in their absence, his letter to the CJI and other judges said.

Maintaining that many lawyers were not well equipped with knowledge on the use of computers, Jadhav pointed out most lawyers were facing severe financial problems during this pandemic, due to staggered working of Courts for the past three months.

"Several lawyers have expressed their concern over to the Executive Committee of SCAORA over the loss of livelihood during the past few months. Unless the normal functioning of courts is resumed, the said concern will not abate," he added.

He said the measures were to be undertaken to resume normalcy in a phased manner, in light of the announcement of the Unlock 1.0.

In view of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Supreme Court on April 6 Suo Motu authorised all the courts to adopt measures required to ensure the robust functioning of the judicial system through the use of video conferencing technologies.

It said court hearings in the congregation must necessarily become an exception during this period of lockdown imposed since March 25 to contain the spread of Coronavirus.