Gujarat HC to live stream proceeding of all 'willing benches' from July 17

In a significant development, the Gujarat High Court on Wednesday announced that it is launching live streaming of court proceedings of all "willing benches" of the court from July 17, making it the first high court in the country to allow public viewing of the proceedings virtually. Earlier, in October 2020, the high court had started live streaming of proceedings of the first court, headed by the chief justice, on YouTube channel for public viewing.

"Thanks to the success of this live streaming experiment, to take forward the implementation of this initiative for the rest of the willing Benches of the High Court, live streaming rules were framed and approved by the Full Court of the High Court on 20th June, 2021. With implementation of these rules, the live streaming of Court Proceedings of the High Court is going to be formally launched in an online inaugural function on 17th July, 2021...", a press statement released by the high court administration stated.

On the launch, Chief Justice of India N V Ramana will be present as the chief guest who will inaugurate the live streaming of court proceedings of the high court. The chief justice will also release “The High Court of Gujarat (Live Streaming of Court Proceedings) Rules, 2021”. On the occasion, Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justice M R Shah, judges at Supreme Court, will be the guest of honour and special guest respectively.

The first court, headed by Chief Justice Vikram Nath, of the Gujarat High Court , started the live telecast of all hearings on experimental basis from 26th October, 2020 on Youtube through the official channel of the High Court. The press note states that "This pilot exercise has successfully continued for more than eight months so far with more than 65,000 subscribers and 41 lakh views received by the official YouTube channel of the high court."