Use Of AI-Generated Fake Judgments : Supreme Court Urges BCI To Form Expert Panel To Examine Issue

The Supreme Court today asked the Bar Council of India to constitute a committee of experts, including field experts, to examine issues arising from the use of artificial intelligence in court proceedings, in a case where a trial court relied on non-existent judgments cited by a litigant.A bench of Justice PS Narasimha and Justice Alok Aradhe said that the committee should submit a report, while clarifying that no formal order was being passed at this stage.The Court was dealing with an SLP challenging a trial court order in a suit for injunction. The trial court had dismissed objections to an Advocate Commissioner's report and relied on four decisions purportedly reported as Subramani v. M. Natarajan (2013) 14 SCC 95, Ramasamy (1071) 2 SCC 68, Chidambaram Pillai v. SAL Lakshmi Devi v. K. Prabha (2006) 5 SCC 551, and Gajanan v. Ramdas (2015) 6 SCC 223.The petitioners challenged the order on the ground that the cited judgments were non-existent and generated using artificial intelligence. The High Court, after noting that the judgments were AI-generated, proceeded to decide the matter on merits and dismissed the civil revision petition while issuing a word of caution.When the matter reached the Supreme Court, observed that reliance on non-existent, AI-generated judgments is not a mere error in decision-making but would amount to misconduct and that legal consequences would follow.“At the outset, we must declare that a decision based on such non-existent and fake alleged judgments is not an error in the decision making. It would be a misconduct and legal consequence shall follow”, the Court had stated, while issuing notice to the Attorney General, Solicitor General and the Bar Council of India, and appointing Shyam Divan as amicus curiae.During the hearing today, the Court emphasised that there must be accountability and integrity in judicial proceedings accountability, remarking that parties cannot just rely on AI-generated material and later apologise for it. It added that similar concerns arise when research at the judge's end leads to citation of non-existent judgments and asked where the responsibility lies to ensure.The Court noted concerns about the absence of sovereign large language models and the risk of hallucinations. It clarified that it is not seeking to prohibit the use of artificial intelligence.Attorney General R Venkataramani told the Court that he would interact with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology before placing his views on this issue. Amicus Curiae Senior Advocate Shyam Divan informed the Court that the Supreme Court's Centre for Research and Planning has prepared a white paper on artificial intelligence in the judiciary containing recommendations and guidelines. That material can serve as a starting point for the Court's inquiry and for issuing directions, he said.The Court remarked that the problem arises because there are no sovereign large language models and the algorithms being used may be open-source, making hallucinations inevitable. It clarified that it is not seeking to prevent the use of artificial intelligence.The Court kept the matter for further consideration on 26th May.Advocate Radhika Gautam appeared for BCI.Case no. – SLP(C) No. 7575/2026Case Title – Gummadi Usha Rani v. Sure Mallikarjuna Rao

Use Of AI-Generated Fake Judgments : Supreme Court Urges BCI To Form Expert Panel To Examine Issue

Amisha Shrivastava

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Use Of AI-Generated Fake Judgments : Supreme Court Urges BCI To Form Expert Panel To Examine Issue

Amisha Shrivastava

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