Do something Judge sahab, 83 thousand cases are pending in Supreme Court, the highest till now

New Delhi: Despite the increase in the number of judges in the Supreme Court, the pile of cases is not decreasing. In the last 10 years, the number of cases has increased 8 times and only twice has there been some decrease. The highest number of cases pending in the Supreme Court till date is 83,000. In the year 2009, the number of judges in the Supreme Court was increased from 26 to 31. Despite this, the number of pending cases continued to increase. In 2013, this number increased from 50,000 to 66,000. In 2014, during the tenure of then CJI P. Sadashivam and RM Lodha, this number decreased to 63,000. After this, in 2015, during the tenure of CJI HL Dattu, this number decreased to 59,000.

How did pending cases increase?

After this, during the tenure of CJI T.S. Thakur, this number again increased to 63,000. Justice J.S. Khehar first proposed paperless court by using information technology in case management system. During his/her tenure, the number of pending cases decreased significantly and it came down to 56,000. In 2018, when Justice Deepak Mishra was CJI, the number of pending cases increased to 57,000.

There are not so many pending cases even during Covid

As CJI, Justice Ranjan Gogoi was successful in convincing the government to increase the number of SC judges. In 2019, a law was passed in Parliament to increase the number of SC judges from 31 to 34. But even after the increase in the number of judges, the number of pending cases increased and this number increased to 60,000. When Justice S.A. Bobde was the CJI, the justice system had come to a complete standstill due to the Covid pandemic. After some time, the justice system resumed through virtual hearings, but the number of pending cases increased to 65,000.

Last year the cases reached 79000

During the tenure of CJI NV Ramanna in 2021-22, the disposal of cases continued to be affected due to Covid. The number of pending cases reached 70,000 in 2021 and by the end of 2022, this number increased to 79,000. This year, CJI Ramanna and UU Lalit retired and Justice DY Chandrachud took over as CJI.

More than 4 thousand pending cases increased in two years

The number of pending cases has increased by about 4,000 in the last two years and this number is about to cross the figure of 83,000. Under the leadership of Justice Chandrachud, many innovative IT based technological measures were taken to divide the pending cases into different categories and list similar cases together, but despite all this, the number of pending cases continues to increase. As of today, 82,831 cases are pending, out of which 27,604 cases (33% of the total cases) are pending for less than a year. This year 38,995 new cases were filed, while the SC disposed of 37,158 cases. That is, as many cases were disposed of, as many new cases were filed.

The same is the case with the High Court

In 2014, a total of 41 lakh cases were pending in the High Court. Only once in the last decade has the number of pending cases seen a decrease. This number was 41 lakh in 2014, which increased to 61 lakh in 2023 and has come down to 59 lakh this year. In 2014, 2.6 crore cases were pending in the lower courts, which has now increased to 4.5 crore.