The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to entertain a Special Leave Petition (SLP) seeking expeditious hearing of a pending matter before the Allahabad High Court, observing that routine directions for early disposal of cases cannot be issued without considering the heavy judicial burden on High Courts.
The three-judge Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice Vipul Pancholi observed that repeated directions from the Supreme Court fixing timelines for disposal of matters could place excessive pressure on High Court judges and adversely affect the hearing of older pending cases.
During the hearing, the CJI referred to a recent judicial order passed by Allahabad High Court judge Justice Subhash Vidyarthi, who had reportedly continued hearing matters till around 7:10 pm in order to comply with a direction issued for expedited consideration of a case. The High Court judge had recorded in the order that he was physically exhausted, hungry and unable to dictate the judgment after sitting beyond regular court hours.
Referring to the incident, the CJI observed that such situations required introspection on the part of the Apex Court while issuing directions for priority hearing of cases pending before High Courts. The Bench noted that High Courts, particularly the Allahabad High Court, were functioning under immense docket pressure and dealing with an exceptionally high volume of fresh and pending matters on a daily basis.
The Court also expressed concern that routine directions for out-of-turn hearing may indirectly interfere with the roster management and judicial functioning of High Courts. The Bench observed that the Allahabad High Court had more than 100 judges, and managing allocation of cases and priority hearings was an administrative responsibility of the Chief Justice of the High Court.
During the proceedings, the Bench pointed out that several petitions seeking expedited hearing of matters pending before the Allahabad High Court were being filed before the Supreme Court on a regular basis. The Court observed that granting priority to relatively recent matters would inevitably come at the cost of older pending cases, including cases involving economically weaker litigants who may not have the resources to approach the Supreme Court for urgent relief.
The Bench further observed that systemic issues relating to pendency and judicial delays could not be resolved merely through repeated judicial directions for expedited hearings. It noted that ordering early disposal in one matter often displaced other long-pending matters already awaiting adjudication before the High Court.
The Special Leave Petition pertained to a case pending since 2021 before the Allahabad High Court. However, the Supreme Court declined to pass any direction for time-bound disposal and instead granted liberty to the petitioner to move the High Court seeking an out-of-turn hearing in accordance with law.
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