About 19 percent of the pending cases in the court are older than five years, states the National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG).
Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court has an average of 500 to 700 cases pending every month. In over 30 years, 1,90,815 cases are still left, according to statistics from National Judicial Data Grid.
A research report from DAKSH India shows that the average time taken for a case to be cleared in Karnataka High Court is about four years. Rajesh M., a resident of Kengeri, said his case of land dispute against his family has been going on for five years. “The court keeps giving another date for judgement, sometimes it is next month, or months later,” he said.
Syed Altaf Ahmed, senior advocate and legal consultant, said, “The reason behind a lot of pending cases could be because of the piled up files in the recording room. The online portal to track cases also has too much traffic, making following up difficult.”
Jyothi, an advocate in the High court said, “I have seen a lot of clients come in hope of justice, especially civil cases, and have to fight for years. Some of them even quit midway,” she said.
Ganesh R., another lawyer, said that the number of cases disposed of by the Karnataka court is still better than other states. The court could work on clearing older pending cases for better efficiency as the clients get tired of running from one place to another to seek justice for longer period of time, he said. “The judicial system can definitely work on that,” he added.
Nagendra Murthy, law professor at JSS Law College, said that the pattern is similar every year. “The clearance rate on the high court’s website has an unstable pattern every year.” He added, “The issue of pending cases is prevalent in a lot of courts, not only in Karnataka, so the only solution could be making a better and faster legal system for now.”
