March of technology- Advocates Clerks Facing A Humanitarian Issue, Will Help Them To Develop Soft skills So That They Can Be Part Of The E-Court Project: Justice Chandrachud

Canvassing the future plans of the Supreme Court E-Committee to secure 100% digital literacy for the E-courts project, Justice D. Y. Chandrachud on Tuesday expressed that in this behalf, he looks forward to the collaboration of the students with the prison authorities and the prisons "because that is really the area which is the weak link in the legal system in our country"The chairman of the E-Committee was delivering the key-note address at the Digital Distribution of the eCertificates for the Master Trainers.He shared that the special drive outreach calendar for 2022 has identified 10 categories of stakeholders, including public, litigants, law students through the law schools, advocates, advocate clerks, police officials and prison authorities.Justice Chandrachud said that the next step is to start training law students in the law colleges because "we must have digital programmes to impart training and digital literacy to the law students so that they become comfortable with the use of technology""We are developing a special programme for visually challenged court staff and judicial officers. That is very critical to our accessibility initiative. We are developing a special outreach programme for the marginalised sections- women, LGBTQ, and persons with disabilities. Justice Moushumi Bhattacharya of the Calcutta High Court is developing a comprehensive module on how we can use technology and the knowledge component of the e-courts project to facilitate this particular initiative", continued Justice Chandrachud."It has been proposed to have the Outreach programmes closely coordinated with the NJA and the SJAs. I will soon be writing to all the High Courts with the E committee calendar of 2022. I request all high courts to inject at least two e-court programmes per month in their training programmes through the State judicial Academies to accelerate the ICT awareness and digital capacity building. We are conscious of the regular calendar of each Academy. The training may be shifted from the conventional model. It can be held in 30 to 45 minute sessions during the working days so as to bring about minimum dislocation in the conventional training program...", expressed the judge.At the outset, the judge narrated how with the sudden onset of the pandemic, our judiciary answered the call of the pandemic with the judicial infrastructure created through the e-courts project, immediately shifting to the digital space through video conference hearings, e-filing, E-payments and virtual courts- "A serious need was felt to take the advocates on board as there existed a great digital divide and a great amount of digital illiteracy. It all actually started in the meeting of the E committee which was held on 3 July 2020. AG K. K. Venugopal suggested the need for imparting training for advocates on the basic digital usage and the e-court services. Based on the suggestion, the E committee passionately formulated a special drive in ICT for advocates and clerks."Justice Chandrachud elaborated that 2 significant steps were taken by the E committee- first, creating advocate master trainers for the taluka, district and state bar associations across India, and second, creating awareness programmes for advocates and advocate clerks in all regional languages across India. "Because we do believe, in the e-committee, that our mission would not be completed unless we get these important stakeholders on board. Very often, it is believed that the work of e-committee would be in the realm of hardware and software. But we have gone beyond. We think it is very important for us to develop soft skills as well. Training and knowledge component is very important in the e-courts project. We are working simultaneously on both", said the judge."We have 4050 advocate master trainers. The committee has identified the technically qualified advocate master trainers. 4050 advocates were nominated from bar associations across the country, representing the taluka level, district level and state-level bar Associations. They were trained in 96 training groups in five zones with an average of about 50 to 55 advocates per group. The training to the advocates was imparted by 461 judicial officer master trainers of the E committee. The E committee has enriched its technical human resources with these 4000 master trainers who represent every taluka, district and state level bar Association. They have become an ICT helpdesk for their bar associations. These master trainers will impart basic computer related training to other advocates", continued Justice Chandrachud."Our advocates' awareness programme in regional languages has a reach of 2,21,000 views, which would have reached much higher now. As part of the special drive initiative of the E committee, the advocates and advocates' clerks awareness programmes in regional languages were conducted all over the country. As of 31st December, 2021, the awareness outreach programmes for advocates and advocates'...

March of technology- Advocates Clerks Facing A Humanitarian Issue, Will Help Them To Develop Soft skills So That They Can Be Part Of The E-Court Project: Justice Chandrachud

Mehal Jain

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