Justice Chandrachud Bats For Digitisation Of Court Records, Lauds Orissa High Court Model

The Orissa High Court observed the 'First Anniversary' of the Record Room Digitisation Centre ('RRDC') on Friday at the Odisha Judicial Academy, Cuttack. The event witnessed the virtual presence of Dr. Justice Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud, Judge, Supreme Court of India and the Chairperson of the Apex Court's E-Committee as the 'Chief Guest'. Chief Justice of the Orissa High Court Dr. Justice S. Muralidhar, Judges of the High Court and the members of the RRDC Committee headed by Justice Debabrata Dash remained present on the occasion. While beginning his keynote address, Justice Chandrachud expressed his immense pleasure to deliver the speech on the occasion as coincidentally he was the one who had inaugurated the Centre last year on 11th September. He said, the Orissa High Court has been truly in the 'forefront' in implementing initiatives of the E-Committee of the Supreme Court of India. He vividly remembered his last year's address at the inauguration of the RRDC and the launch of the e-filing stations and the first paperless Court in the Orissa High Court. Words of Appreciation for Orissa High Court:He said, the mark of this one year exhibits a period of continuous efforts, of hardwork and perseverance towards institutionalising the digitisation in Courts. He stated that framing of a policy in a room of policy-experts is not the most difficult task nor is its initiatives, it is important that we continue implementation of the project.He applauded Orissa High Court for being an 'exception' and for putting incessant efforts to institutionalise digitisation. He expressed his satisfaction over the fact that Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) on digitisation has been followed in letter and spirit. He said, while the onset of pandemic had radically changed the usual working of our justice delivery system, it also presented our institutions with a unique opportunity to build boldly upon this transition and put in place improved and sustainable systems of Court services. He highlighted that transformation of our justice delivery system requires the building up of Court capabilities that are scalable, stable and crucially designed for the use both by laypersons and lawyers. "Today, from that perspective, I am very proud to witness the first of the many transformations in action at the Orissa High Court, which are being spearheaded by Chief Justice Muralidhar", he added.By establishing the record room and initiating the process of digitising records, he said, the High Court has not only created a sustainable service which can outlast the pandemic but also ensured that the initiatives are no longer in response to a difficulty but rather they are driven by an active endeavour to create a robust judicial system that is open and accessible. He expressed his satisfaction and mentioned,"The record room has digitised over 5,19,075 files so far. This is truly a commendable feat, which has ushered in an era of open and transparent justice delivery system."During the speech, an interesting thing happened. While Justice Chandrachud was speaking something, he lost his internet connection. It took moments to join back in the meeting again. After he resumed his address, he remarked, "Sorry, as with all the technologies, there is always a little glitch which we can overcome of course." This triggered a good laugh from the audience.Then he proceeded and told the audience that the metadata which is stored in such digitised records will further serve as fail-safe mechanism to ensure that legacy records of the pending cases are not manipulated. "Once such digitisation process is standardised across Courts in India, it will ensure the inter-operability between data repositories, which will make our justice delivery system more seamless and efficient", he said.Three Important Features of Digitisation:Justice Chandrachud mentioned three important features of digitisation. Firstly, the Court is an institution of records. The mandate is to store Court records for perpetual use. It is challenging to store documents in hard form and to prevent their degradation. He said,"Recently, I saw images of deplorable state of Court records across the country and digitisation, therefore, is an able tool that aid us in preserving the documents. Digitisation, in a sense, has heritage value for researchers. It places all our Courts, including the Orissa High Court in a unique position in the history of our nation. The records are being digitised, commencing from the Sadar Dewani Adalat from the 1800's".Secondly, he said, digitisation would promote transparency, access and efficiency and third, digitisation would promote better management of knowledge and information flows.Initiative Taken as a Judge of Bombay High Court:He also shared his own initiatives as a Judge of the Bombay High Court and said,"When I as a Judge of the Bombay High Court, I initiated the digitisation of the library, which also included digitisation of prominent cases, such as the trial ...

Justice Chandrachud Bats For Digitisation Of Court Records, Lauds Orissa High Court Model

Jyoti Prakash Dutta

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