New Delhi, July 18
Union Law Minister M Veerappa Moily today said all the courts in the country would be brought on “fast track” to dispose of cases within three years under a “revolutionary” legal reforms process involving an expenditure of Rs 15,000 crore in five years.

“In future, all the courts should come on fast track. Fast track courts cannot work in isolation,” Moily told reporters while summarizing the proceedings of a meeting of the Northern region. The meeting was held to discuss utilization of the Rs 5,000 crore recommended by the 13th Finance Commission for judicial reforms.

Among those who attended the meeting were High Court Chief Justices or their representatives and law and finance ministers from Punjab, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Delhi.

Moily said the Centre would provide an additional Rs 9,500 crore as one-time allocation, over and above the Finance Commission recommendations, for setting up 12,000 courts more by 2012, for filling up vacancies in courts and augmentation of infrastructure facilities of the judiciary.

Similar regional consultations had already been held in the East, North East and South and the last in the series would be held soon in Goa for the West. After this, guidelines would be issued for fund utilisation. The entire programme would be implemented on a war-footing, the Minister said.

He, however, made it clear that there was no consensus so far on the proposed formation of an All India Judicial Service. “There is no unanimity and we do not want to impose it. Consultations will continue with all the stake-holders.” The Justice Department in his ministry would prepare a paper for larger discussion. “Any decision will be taken only after due deliberations and consultations.”

The village courts being set up under the Gram Nyayalaya scheme was turning out to be a “movement” involving more and more mobile courts, including on running trains. The plan for the release of undertrial prisoners was proceeding well, with 1.6 lakh such prisoners already set free against the target of two lakhs. The idea was to reduce the number of undertrials in jails by two-third — from three lakh to one lakh.

There was also a plan to train public prosecutors on a priority basis. States would be allowed flexibility to prepare their own priority lists for the reform process. Litigants embroiled in family disputes would not have to approach different courts as there would be a single-window facility soon with just one family court handling all sorts of such cases. As announced by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh recently, 71 additional CBI courts would be set up in the country to dispose of corruption cases on “highest priority”.

Clarifications could not be sought from the Minister as he did not take any questions. He, however, maintained that the proposals would make the country’s judicial system the best in the world.