Public sentiment around the Indian judiciary is a complex tapestry of appreciation for educational resources provided by Priya Jain and significant dissatisfaction with systemic issues like corruption, inefficiency, and a lack of accountability. Many commenters express a desire for reforms to improve access and efficiency in legal processes, while also acknowledging the need for further educational content to navigate these challenges effectively.

Priya Jain

Indian Judiciary

Indian Government

Lawyer here, can confirm. The number of times I've had to read a judgment of 50+ pages during my internship and college is just staggering. A lot of the times you find contradictions in judgments and as pointed out above, there are absolute tangents that the judges go on that has nothing to do with anything.

Ggwpul

Serious question: Is there a forum/ombudsman body for the judiciary where such issues can be raised? 

Approximately how many such judgements do you see every month?

extrapao

As another practicing advocate, I would like to let you guys know that this is not the case with all judges. There are judges who like to write elaborate judgements maybe because they think there is a need to elucidate their point or because they want to show off. There are comparably equal judges in the higher courts who write crisp and to the point judgements. 

Tldr: Judgements are written in all shapes and sizes. 

_snorlax__

Given that I was judged in exams in high school and college on the thickness of my answer sheet as much if not more as the content, this does not surprise me. We are not laconic. Our Constitution itself is ridiculously verbose. We still hold the record for the longest speech in the UN. It took me a long time to unlearn the verbose way I was taught to write letters, which I carried over to emails. 

I honestly think we should start a non-government, non-profit watchdog for compiling, analyzing and recording everything that the judiciary does. We know almost nothing about our third branch of the Government. 

kolikaal

I believe you're incorrect to say it started after 1970. The problem of nearly 40,000 judgments since 1950, many of which run into hundreds of pages was acknowledged by the SC. [Source](http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Supreme-Court-judges-bat-for-succinct-judgments/articleshow/45017501.cms?nltype=&amp;newsletter=)

I think so after 1970's it has reduced to 10 pages long as you say. (Not sure, can you provide a citation)

SC judges have informally come together to accept a hitherto unadmitted yet serious problem — verbose verdicts often create confusion, both for law and litigants. This is just one of the reasons for delay in rendering speedy justice to litigants.

In 2014, CJI Justice HL Dattu, had set up two committees to tackle arrears in both — the SC and HCs. I could not find their reports though. However, the trend in pending cases in decreasing, whilein HC and lower courts it is increasing.

Many SC CJI's have been advocating need to render speedy justice and you can see a report on 'Law's Delays: Arrears In Courts', tabled in Rajya Sabha in 2011 [here](http://164.100.47.5/newcommittee/reports/EnglishCommittees/Committee%20on%20Home%20Affairs/85threport%20.htm)

I've found that there are various measures which are being followed now. Right from Magistrates, to Judges in Lower Courts  to HC  - all of them have a specific number of cases that they need to dispose in certain period of time. Their performance is analysed based on that and their promotions are based on it.

The other reasons delaying speedy justice is 

- The advocates who wantonly drag the cases to favor their litigants and thereby add to the chaos. 

- Many advocates also file private petitions full well knowing that there is no substance to the case and this adds a huge number to the cases.

- Inordinate delay in filling up vacancy of judges - in HC and lower courts, this is the main reason for the rise in pending cases.

- Lack of computerization of the lower courts (where there are the most number of cases!)- this archaic system of writing on papers/typing it out, storing it, retrieving it etc add to delay and also gives rise to corruption and other illegal activities!

- setting up additional fast track courts. I also feel instead of just dividing the lower courts to Civil &amp; Criminal, if more additional courts are setup to just focus on specific cases say for example, a special court to just look on matrimonial cases, inordinate delay andpressure on the magistrates will be reduced significantly.

This is not exhaustive list though. I hope such reforms will ensure speedy and impartial justice to litigants.

modiusoperandi

[deleted]

SCCOnline has tl;dr version inform of case notes. But it can be costly. 

Yes, I absolutely agree with the point about the lengthy judgements. 
I am a law student. Last semester we had two read two judgements Menaka Gandhi and Bachan Singh in our English class. Our teacher told us to treat them not as a judgement but as a piece of literature and analyze. She made us skip most of it, though. Bachan Singh was bearable but Menaka Gandhi was not. It was page after page of useless quotations. It had quotations from Vivekananda, Plato, Chanakya and bazzillion others, just to prove the point that travelling is a part of right to life (art 21) and then there was so much repetitive arguments on why it is not in art 19(1)(g). And man was it anti climactic, they didn't even give her passport back.

Justice Krishna Iyer had way with the words. He wrote beautifully but dude chill, you don't need to prove it to us that you are smart. You are a SC judge, we know you know more than us. I'd quote him from another important judgement of his, Shamsher Singh v State of Punjab 
         Not the Potomac but the Thames fertilises the flow of Yamuna.
 Not ashamed to say that had to Google it to find its meaning and you bet I wrote it in my consti exam. :-) 


I remember one time we were reading a judgement for a moot. It was a Delhi HC judgement. It was a COPRA case on  doctor's negligence and this judge had gone on for pages just stating that doctors are supposed to be miracle workers, they are supposed to do good and if they are negligent, how much loss is caused to a person. And then it was repeated in the part where compensation has to be determined. I can't find the judgement, will link if I do. 

Ps. We were taught how to identify the ratio decidendi in class. But it can be so hard. I read just case notes on SCC and then more if it seems relevant. 



tl;dr I concur with the opinion presented by the OP. And I had nothing much or new to add but still wrote this long ass comment.

This was new my uncle practising in Chhattisgarh HC told me that High court judges take eternity to give judgements as they don't know very good english . He was talking of judges promoted from state judicial services where they mostly gave judgements in Hindi 

Judiciary is one big black box . 

phone_throw12

You know what they say, lawyers are writers who needed a job.

WagwanKenobi

Thanks for sharing. As laypersons, this isn't something that we are aware of. Is there a forum/committee/council where this issue can be addressed? 

White_lilies

randianNo1

The problem is when our Parliament tries to do something about improving court system. The court shut it down. 

I totally believe that judicial appointment bill was really good since I think most high Court judges are corrupt and appoint their kids to power .

dinonia

In addition to what you said, I have noticed something else as well: The dissenting opinions have become much shorter nowadays. In most judgments given in 50s or 60s, the dissenting opinion (if there was any) ran into many pages, often being at least 75% size of the other part of the judgment. In fact, I've come across a few judgments where the dissenting opinion was longer than the binding opinion.

It appears now, though, that judges do not feel the need to 'waste' their time writing long opinions which are not even binding. Perhaps this or some other reasoning, I'm not sure. But I do not agree; dissenting opinions are one of the things that make judgments 'fun' to me - it also ensures that all sides were adequately discussed and argued before the court, and the idea finds a mention there. In fact, recently a nine-judge bench upheld a dissenting opinion given by Justice Sinha several decades ago! I like to believe that dissents hold ideas, very strong ideas, right AND wrong, all essential for a society.

But of course, that's my observation and belief.

patanahi

dhakkarnia

As much as I love Katju, his judgements are filled with a *lot* of rhetoric and analogy.

RagiModi

Doctors, auditors and lawyers. They don't tend to keep things simple. 

lungiwarrior

I don't understand. Can you make us understand with an example?

National Award Winner for "Best Feature Film" 2015  [COURT (Movie)] (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3717068/)

rajesh8162

This is why need automation to happen in India.


iamaguythrowaway

Can confirm. I am a stenographer in some court.

musiczlife

India mein shuru se problem hai bhai. we were asked to write a 2 page answer for a 6 mark question, 1 page answer for 4 mark question, half page for 2 mark ques. 

Content gaya tel lene. I was the "fuck the rules" kid who wrote brief few sentence answers for all questions. I obviously was a "poor student".

When the "good students" grow up into being SC/HC judges, they continue doing what they were asked to do. 


karmanye

Remember reading about the judgement in the Aarushi case from the Ghaziabad court judge in Avirook Sen's book Aarushi. Author deduces that he started writing the judgement even before the arguments were complete.

paritan

when my gas cylinder got stolen i had to wait for 2 years for my cylinder.
i had to lie in order to save my future time.. i was witness and i had to deny.
time wasted 2 years=cylinder price=3000rs only.
travel expense=500bucks?
police man asked for bribe=500rs

Conclusion:WTF? 

Metromask1

This is so on point. The excessive verbosity in most of these judgments is an issue for sure.

LadaakuVimaan

Yup, you are absolutely right. I, too, recently happen to come across a judgment of Supreme Court of India, in which, first 50 pages tried to validate the actual judgment delivered in last two pages. There is one more thing that I would like to add and that is reconciliation of earlier judgments in similar cases.  

Quosher

While for the ease of working, my fellow advocated, you can use provakil - available on Android,iOS and web

That last page is the order which is basically the meat of the judgement because it enumerates the sentencing and other stipulations like parole and whether it is a rigorous or simple imprisonment and whether the convict is allowed remissions and other perks under the terms of the sentence.

But yeah, I've seen fifty plus page judgements for simple theft of Chinese mobile where the value of stolen goods is less than Rs. 800. 

evequest

Off topic - I think the Marathi movie 'court' depicted the state of Indian judiciary quite well, it's a good movie, available on Netflix.

typical_randian_says

Slash their budget for stationery. That'll stop them from writing longer judgements.

eva01beast

Being a student in one of the topmost law universities in the country, I find basis in all of the points raised by the OP. The situation is particularly damning when you consider the judgments of some judges making shameless use of tools like thesaurus. *cough* *deepakmishra* *cough*

prataprajput

Very nice ti know. Thanks for bringing this up

rahulkaid

I would recommend to ask this question to Markandey Katju, however he seems to be not active in social media since a while now. However you can try mailing him.

annyarun

Here's a Caravan piece on what you're talking about, OP.

http://www.caravanmagazine.in/perspectives/critical-judgment-courts-vague-prose



shadowbannedguy1

Most judgements are actually written by researchers working under judges of supreme court, know this because my friend is a researcher. Judgements are long because judges pass orders giving reasons for accepting or ignoring argument  presented by the defendant and respondents.Mostly they follow IRAC procedure when writing the judgement. Our judicial system do sucks but its not because of the incumbents but because of our law makers. Also its our advocates who are hell bent on taking cases to court rather then focusing on arbitration between the parties concerned.

yokomotive

Now read Sandra Day O'Connor's dissent in the Land Snatching case.   

https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/545/469/dissent.html  

Or Antonin Scalia's concurring opinion on allowing sale of violent video games due to the 1st Amendment.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/08-1448.ZO.html

Crisp &amp; clear enough for a layman like me to understand.   


off topic question: Are judges in India also corrupt ? do they take bribe?

I never saw any judge getting punished for some crime, is it so? 

micropanda

&gt; every single one of them started writing longer judgments, fluffing them up with completely useless content

I do that all the time for my university exams. Just write 2-3 page long answers and voila ! The more the page, the more the marks.

You should be able to "peruse" a ten page judgement very quickly to find the stare decisis. If you want obiter, look for it.

Byxit

What do you think about lower courts ? Do you know in tier 2 and 3 citys and towns there is huge ring of judges police and lawyers who try to profit from innocent people.

hd-86

Too long a post, dude. Can you summarize?

DarthSimian

Don't courts publish a judgement and a separate 'opinions' of the court judges ? The judgement should be succinct while the opinion can be of a rambling nature but it is not mandatory to read it to understand the judgement ?


Why isnt there an organization that hires lawyers to go through judgements and write relevant summary papers? They can then sell the papers to lawyers and judges. [Initially, they can do this on a made-to-order basis, later on, once enough traction is present, they can summarize most judgements and give out a subscription model]. 

Given the cost of a lawyer's hours, they can charge huge sums and still attract heavy traffic.

And sometimes that is 30% of times, the cases if they are dealing with tax will ascertain questions of say lease or something else or if the case is arbitration then the Judge will spend more than half of the case discussing matters of competition or a critique of something. Like dude get on with it. Clear, precise judgements please!

Munchkinnotmunching

Thanks to the OP for his detailed account.

That said, for all these flaws the nature of our administrative and political system is such that there are good reasons why people still trust the judiciary above everything else.

swacchreddit

Quick delivery of justice is sine qua non for efficient jurisprudence.

briefsbandit

I suggest writing the judgements like research papers.

First, an abstract : Tell me what is it about in the most crisp and formal manner.

Then, put the main meat of the judgement : All the technicalities, circumstances and stuff related to the case with respective diagrams.

At the end, the conclusion : what judgement did you eventually deliver for the case, and how do you wish it be interpreted if presented in future cases.

Now that I'm writing this comment, I realise that it's a pretty shitty idea and judgements certainly don't work like that, but hey, it's r/india; yaha nahi toh kaha

yculcarneee

Kesavananda Bharati. Still have nightmares about that.

6732402

It's common law syndrome, everyone wants to be the Maverick that changes the law and get quoted in the textbooks after getting invited to all the dinners. 

While there's good common law judges, and even some of the long winded ones are excellent, but as well as making cases 50 pages long by rehashing what the leading judgement says, the length of judgements can lad to some serious mental gymnastics.  I know it's wrong to be butthurt about a case 20 years on, but bruton (english court saying a proprietary right that didn't exist could be passed) was an example of that. 

redpossum

Respected Seniors, I am a second-year law student and seeking your guidance on a query regarding court procedure. What does it mean when a judge instructs an advocate to ‘get instructions’?

Does that mean getting order or notice from a concerned person or authority ?

Unable_Pea3922

So basically judges need to : 

`jury@SupremeCourt $ pass-judgement  --verbose = False`

stochastic_zeitgeist

Firstly, as there are only 15 judges per million citizens, that number needs to be increased at least two times. 

Secondly, stricter timelines for deciding cases must be adopted and unnecessary delays must mandatorily be met with the imposition of real costs. Similarly, interim injunctions and stays on proceedings of the Subordinate Courts must be finally disposed off with urgency. 

Thirdly, appeals, revisions, and other remedies (except 32 and 226) to the High Courts and the Supreme Court must be curtailed by statute and / or specialised tribunals should be used to reduce workload on Constitutional Courts. 

Fourthly, ADR mechanisms need to be made worthwhile to reduce the reliance on Courts. 

Fifthly, the State must adopt policies to reduce litigation initiated by it and the spirit behind provisions like Section 80, CPC must be followed in cases against the State.

_UBERRIMA_FIDES

Judges nahi hai bhai.

 There are more than 3 crore pending cases that's one case for every 50 people in this country the amount of judges pale in comparison to the sheer number of cases.

In lower court there is requirment of thousands of judges which are not sanctioned. 

In high courts there are 370 vacant judge positions against a sanctioned strength of 1100+ that means over 30% of high judge seats are vacant.

Plus judiciary has fixed holiday stretch (at least 40-50)  in which only a very small vacation bench sits. 

 Kaise hoga kaam?

Ok_Simple_459

msaussieandmrravana

End corruption + enforce rules and laws as they are for EVERYONE.

tarunag10

I wonder what stops GOI increase number of judges ?

kthdeep

LLM models should be of help. Some companies already working in this direction.

devraj_aa

Competitive-Pride-10

Put hefty penalty on the lawyer who’s asking for continuance, irrespective of the reason!

I’ve had my fair share of courts n ‘dates’ n lawyers et el. My father fought a case on my behalf, n it went all the way up to The Supreme Court of India. Once a wise guy told me that “courts are meant to get justice” is a misnomer. Courts are there only for the livelihood of judges n lawyers n everyone else working in courts!

ExplanationOld4473

if everybody follows rules and constitution then no jujji court kacheri required.

Radiant_Historian854

Bigger law firms and competitive so they finish off the cases as fast as possible and even settle out of courts because independent lawyers many times just drag the cases for fees and hope in mean time judges are increased at least fill up the vacancy.

raj_abhay

Decentralisation. Emphasis on community based settlement whereevr possible, atleast in civil cases.
Overtime for judges. No winter and summer vacation. Annual final judgement targets for each judge. Promotion only on the achievement of target. 
Increase the number of judges.
Make judiciary politically free.
No appointments for the retired judges, till two general elections, or two central govt changes after the retirement.

anwerified

1. There need to be preasure on judges to clear the cases like any employe in private sector has defined timelines for work to be finished. Then judges will put preasures on both parties to attend. If one party try to delay by not attending penalize that fellow by not fining Rs600, make Rs60,000. 

2. You need over all Manager to moniter judges to make sure they clear cases fast. 

  
Delaying justice is denaying justice.

  
Somebody occupied our plot by dismantling compound wall. It took 10 years. It ended not because of judgement, it was because of the person who occupied died. Every time there was court date, he is used to submit doctor certificate and not attended.

Ragnarok-9999

Firstly Mi lords need to descend to earth to deal with us commoners

Absolutely no adjournment if someone in Jail, hearing should finish and judgement pronounced. If that is not possible grant bail. 
Other cases adjournment only 3 times. Pending cases disposed automatically.

Dry_Philosopher_4817

make law book tiny and too the point with simple words.
reduce loop holes. use AI to make it compact.

india has 'world's largest' law. i think this is the core issue.

PlantTreesEveryday

To anyone who might be outraged, that the Judge did not even read the file -
Notice the judge says "you want the order on merits?", the lawyer says nothing but that the accused is only 18 years of age. Moreover, it was just a bail application that has been dismissed, the case might get decided in the favour of the applicant eventually. 
*I'm a final year law student with decent experience in High courts. Feel free to ask me anything, hopefully i'll be able to answer correctly.

Diablo442

OMG GUYS. I was trying to find out the street value of Heroin in India. 


Fucking UN maintains a nice spreadsheet of street values in every country. I literally cannot. 

https://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/WDR2011/WDR_Final_Prices_crop.pdf

This is nothing. Most judges are worst than your your colony uncles. Court hearing has nothing to do with logic and arguments as shown in movies. Mostly it depends on reputation of your lawyer and mood of the judge.

AnxiousBlock

Just two things:  

1) Am I responsible if the drug is not found on me but on a pillion rider on the vehicle I'm driving?  

2) If your answer for (1) was no, is the judge right to dismiss my case without even hearing my argument that literally clears me of all charges?

horaLoca

Most people won't even believe the kind of corruption that exists in court offices. If they come to know of those things, 'faith in judiciary' will go tel lagaane!!

exxentricity

Guys as a lawyer, just wanna mention my 2 cents on this - 

i. Saw someone ask if the lawyer is the defendant - most crim lawyers place arguments in the first person. This way, instead of having to keep saying shit like - the claimant/accused was not found in possesion of blah blah, they can simply say I &amp; be done with it. Makes life easy for the court, the lawyer &amp; the reporter. 

ii. At the bail stage - technically none of this matters. If y'all wanna read up on this, for bail there's a triple test which is applied to see if bail should be granted for non-bailable offences (all offences under NDPS are non-bailable). They keep mentioning the quantity to ascertain the accused' role in the offence &amp; the severity of the offence as well. 

iii. Saw someone say that the lawyer could've defended the judges questions better - while it sounds stupid, the judge from the very beginning didn't seem like he wanted to give bail. By continuing to pester him, not only would the lawyer risk something stupid (like a bail bond of 1 cr for example) he'd just be wasting his time. Instead, what he'll probably do now, is approach the High Court for bail as an appeal against this order. Because the judge got the quantity wrong &amp; because the decision to not give bail was based on merits as opposed to the settled law on bail, this is more feasible. 

However, the judicial trend against NDPS offenders is currently extremely strict in India, with bail not being granted in most cases. It sucks, but it's the unfortunate truth.

Lelekele

I'm confused. Is that the lawyer or the defendant himself?? He is talking in first person and the judge is also berating him in first person!!

And just to be clear, it was a bail hearing that was denied right??

It's clear that the judge is being sarcastic from the beginning and the quantity is clearly above the limit so why is OP objecting here?? Is it because the substance was found on the other person and this guy was clean so he shouldn't be charged as we see under US law??

 Genuinely asking

blackbeard_qar

I thought the illustration of courts in Jolly LLB 1 and 2 were an exaggeration. This proves them to be accurate depictions.

kira920

SarathExp

Comfortable_Ninja_23

Can someone explain what he was caught with? Not familiar with the Hindi word

insane36969

Why is the accused telling the judge that its value is in lakhs when the judge thinks it is like 10-20 rs?

throwawayfebind

Nothing wrong here. The judge was being sarcastic from the start as it was a serious crime which the defence was trying to make light of. Drug charges in india are backed by very stringent laws and are non-bailable offences. Remember the crores of rupees blackmailed from Sharukh Khan when his son was entrapped?

thewebdev

There's absolutely nothing wrong in this. NDPS is a very stringent piece of legislation. Once you're caught in the possession of the contrabend, there is very little one can argue. All depends on the quantity and the type of drug seized. And people before forming any opinion should understand that this was a bail application not the trial. It is the discretionary power of judge whether to allow or reject the bail application.

adityasr33

Nothing wrong here - The judge is just being straight specific and clear, he was playing simpleton in a sarcastic way to troll the lawyer seeking bail application, he says it was not confiscated from him but he was on the same bike and were jointly a part in series of events and evidence related to the drug in question, judge was clear and wise tbh..

Law_Err

Lol, the Judge playing with the counsel with his sarcasm. 😂 Reason why you should go to a decent law school.

Word of advice! Don’t hire this lawyer for your cases ever!

Obvious_Meringue_480

The biggest misconception people (who have never been to court) have that Judges are totally unbiased and fair people. Which is not true. Many a time they judge based on emotions or influence.

crasshumor

Guys don't carry more than 100gm of weed.. or you will fucked like this man here..

How does one prepare oneself mentally to stay 20 years in jail 😲😲

SATYA11891

MonDking

Any wonder why judges and higher judiciary is against live telecast of its proceedings.

First they don't want accountability and second they don't want actual open courts which is literally the law. They want to pass judgements which protect them first and foremost, relief comes second almost always.

obamacare_mishra

lol have u guys heard what judges sometime ask rape victims ? trust on judiciary lol saying this because born in a lawyer family ..... only money power matters even upto highcourt ....

Hot_Platypus_3580

I just love the way judge handled the case

Just sad state of Indian Judiciary,  did  his tune / stance change as soon as he  heard the cost 🤔 . seemed ok initially ..

Paree264

I think you missed the whole point of the video....the hastiness to reject the bail application and to tell the accused to be mentally ready to be in jail for 20 years without any discussion.

UsefulRepublic1926

Honestly tho is there any country with a decent judical system and how do they manage it?  Genuine question lol

Leading_Protection_7

A camera can solve problems that the almighty state cant, BigUp camera

Cyderplz

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