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Furnish details on timelines of verdicts on websites: SC to HCs
The Supreme Court mandated high courts to report judgment timelines, enhancing transparency and accountability in the judicial system.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed all high courts to furnish detailed reports on the timelines of their judgments, including the dates when cases were reserved for verdict, when judgments were pronounced, and when they were uploaded on court websites, while stressing that such transparency would enhance judicial accountability and reduce uncertainty for litigants.
A bench of justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi said that once collated, this data must be placed in the public domain, so that the performance of each of the 25 high courts in delivering and publishing judgments can be tracked in a uniform and transparent manner.
The bench noted that while a uniform format for collecting information was still being developed, the exercise was already yielding positive results.
It emphasised that the eventual goal was to make the information accessible to the public, serving as a tool of institutional transparency. “Most importantly, how many days it took in uploading the judgments,” it underlined.
During the hearing, amicus curiae and advocate Fauzia Shakil suggested creating a digital dashboard displaying the number of reserved and delivered judgments across all high courts. The bench welcomed the proposal, remarking: “That will show the transparency and accountability of the judiciary to the people.”
The amicus informed the court that reports from high courts including Karnataka, Orissa, Jharkhand, Manipur, Tripura, Himachal Pradesh, Bombay, and Calcutta had been received earlier, while those from Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Uttarakhand had since been filed but were yet to be collated.
Taking note of the progress, the bench said the initiative was moving in the right direction. However, it recorded that six high courts—Allahabad, Guwahati, Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh, Kerala, Patna and Telangana, had neither filed their reports nor sought additional time. It directed the registrars general of these high courts to either comply or appear before it on the next date of hearing.
In its order, the court set out a four-week timeline for all high courts to submit the existing mechanism by which each they can bring into public domain the dates of reservation, pronouncement and uploading of judgments, besides details of all judgments reserved after January 31, 2025, along with their dates of pronouncement and uploading up to October 31, 2025. It has also sought suggestions for standardising the format and improving disclosure practices. The bench further directed that high courts must also indicate any practical difficulties or adverse consequences they foresee in adopting a uniform disclosure system.
“Since it may not be advisable for this court to undertake continuous monitoring, we direct all high courts to submit the existing mechanism evolved by them to bring into public domain the date when a judgment is reserved, the date of its pronouncement and the date when it is uploaded on the website,” the order stated.
The ongoing exercise arises out of an earlier proceeding in a case from Jharkhand where the Supreme Court expressed concern over delays in the delivery and publication of judgments. The issue arose after several convicts approached the court alleging that their criminal appeals remained undecided for months or even years after being heard.
In response, the court had directed all high courts to clearly record in every certified copy of their judgments three key dates -- date of reservation, date of pronouncement and date of uploading, and had underscored that reasons must ordinarily follow operative orders within days.
Reiterating the long-term goal, the bench said on Wednesday that the system should offer a comprehensive and consistent overview of judicial performance across all high courts. “In the matter of reserving or pronouncing judgments, it should not be litigant-oriented. It should show the overall picture,” said the court, fixing the next hearing after four weeks.
