A PILOT CAPACITY BUILDING
PROGRAMME FOR COURT
The Government
in the Department of Justice will seek approval of the High Courts
for facility of retrieving certified copies of court orders through
the website on payment by credit cards. This innovation forms
part of the use of information technology in the four metropolitan
cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai at a cost of Rs.
14.91 crore. To begin with, approval of the Delhi High Court will
be sought for commencement of e-facility in Delhi.
The scheme is
being first implemented in Delhi this year. A number of innovative
features in this scheme include electronic filing of documents
and plaints addressed to courts on the website, retrieval of certified
copies of court orders on payment by credit cards, video conference
links in each of the three court complexes in Delhi, Tis Hazari
Courts, Patiala House Courts and Karkarduma Courts, with the prison
and Tihar Jail to do away with the need for transporting under
trials from the jail to the court merely for the remand. This
facility is intended to plug a security loophole and effect considerable
savings in expenditure on transporting under trials. Besides,
Interactive Voice Response System (IVRS) would be installed at
the Central Enquiry and Facilitation Centre to answer telephonic
queries regarding status of cases, dates of hearing etc.
An amount of
Rs. 8.53 crore was released to the Government of National Capital
Territory of Delhi and the State Governments of Maharashtra, West
Bengal and Tamil Nadu during 2001-2002. Out of this, Rs. 4.98
crore was given to Delhi, Rs. 1.56 crore to Mumbai, Rs. 1.17 crore
to Kolkata and Rs. 0.82 crore to Chennai.
The funds have
been released to National Informatics Centre (NIC) for execution
of the scheme in Delhi and to the State Governments of Tamil Nadu,
Maharastha and West Bengal for execution of projects in their
respective jurisdiction in consultation with the concerned High
Court.
The use of information
technology in the metropolitan courts of Chennai, Kolkata and
Mumbai will fructify in 2003-2004.
With the commissioning
of information technology in the metropolitan courts of four metros,
the district and subordinate courts all over the country will
be computerized to provide direct contact points for citizens
for efficient judicial functioning and speedy disposal of cases.
There are about 13,000 subordinate courts in the country. Use
of information technology will substantially contribute to the
capacity building of these courts.
