Delay In Communication Of Bail Orders To Jail Authorities Affects Human Liberty, Must Be Addressed On War Footing: Justice DY Chandrachud

"A very serious deficiency in the criminal justice system is the delay in the communication of bail orders, which we need to address on war footing. Because this touches upon human liberty of every undertrial, or even a convict who has got suspension of sentence under section 389 of the Cr. P. C.", Justice D. Y. Chandrachud has said."One of the initiatives which Chief Justice S. Muralidhar is launching at the Orissa High Court is the E-custody certificate, so that every undertrial and every convict who is undergoing the sentence of imprisonment would have an e-custody certificate tagged to them. That certificate will give us all the requisite data with regard to that particular undertrial or convict, right from initial remand to the subsequent progress of each case. This will also help us in ensuring that bail orders are communicated as soon as they are made, from the place they are communicated, to the jails for immediate implementation", told the judge.Aryan Khan's case has again brought to the fore the issue of delay in the release of a prisoner from jail, despite obtaining bail order and completing surety formalities. In this case, the delay in Khan's release was caused due to certain timing regulations in the Mumbai Central Prison at Arthur Road.He was speaking at the e-Inauguration of Virtual Courts and e-Sewa Kendra at Allahabad High Court and District Court.E-Seva Kendras"What is the need for an E-Seva Kendra? Traditionally, as we understand Information and Communications Technology, we don't need a physical centre or space for the ICT, because you can access ICT wherever you are. The reason we need E-Seva Kendra is because of the digital divide in India. A large part of the population does not have personal access to computers, though ofcourse now smartphones are proliferating even in our rural areas. But there is this great digital divide and the members of the bar are representative of society at large. And judges who were also drawn from the bar and judges from the service segment of the profession as well are representative in that sense of the wide strata of society. We do not stand apart from society or from our bar. We are conscious of the fact that a mission to enhance the engagement of the Indian judiciary with information and communications technology will not be successful unless the most important stakeholders, namely, the citizens have access to it and the lawyers, who are the fearless and independent dispensers of justice hand-in-hand with the judges, have access to ICT. That is why we felt that instead of the citizens having to pursue the court or reach out to the court, the court must come to the citizens and the lawyers. The importance of the E Seva Kendra movement is therefore to provide under one roof all services we provide under the e-courts project, accessible in every establishment of the district judiciary so that lawyers, litigants who seek to find information can easily avail of those services, whether it is providing certified copy or e-payment of court fees or e-filing or videoconferencing", explained Justice Chandrachud."Sometimes, I feel setting up a new thing is difficult in itself but institutionalising something that has been set up is even more difficult. You have to make the new institution a part of the way of life of those who take part in the day-to-day functioning of that institution, who here are the judges, the lawyers, the litigants. It is very important for us to ensure that a permanent staff is attached to the E Seva Kendra. Because my experience across the country has been that the E Seva Kendras set away from the court have not been successful, those which are hidden in some part of the establishment of the court itself are even not successful. Those which are at the forefront of the court, attached to the court, where the litigant has the first interface with the E Seva Kendra have been extremely successful. I do believe as a policy maker, as an administrator, that we learn from mistakes and that we should not be worried about the mistakes that we do and we should not be averse to listening to other stakeholders like the lawyers who tell us that we have to make some changes in what we are doing", he stated.Virtual Courts"The virtual court is equally a matter of utmost importance. To give you an example, virtual courts have now been set up across the country in 12 states for adjudicating traffic challans. Across the country 99.43 lakh cases have been completed. Fines have been collected for 18.35 lakh cases. Total fine collected is over 119 crores of rupees. About 98,000 violators chose to contest the case", told Justice Chandrachud."Now you can imagine that for a common citizen who has a traffic challan, to spend a day away from daily wages and to go to court to pay for the traffic challan is not productive. On the other hand, if virtual courts are dovetailed with a nationalised bank where challans can be paid electronically, it is a win-win situation...

Delay In Communication Of Bail Orders To Jail Authorities Affects Human Liberty, Must Be Addressed On War Footing: Justice DY Chandrachud

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Delay In Communication Of Bail Orders To Jail Authorities Affects Human Liberty, Must Be Addressed On War Footing: Justice DY Chandrachud

Mehal Jain

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