Daily Pioneer:Thursday, January 12, 2012.
The courts should seriously take the criticism over repeated adjournments of cases by the judiciary, especially at the lower courts’ level. Even the Supreme Court recently bemoaned the frequent adjournments for the flimsiest of reasons. It said, “It is sad, but true, that the litigants seek and the courts grant adjournments at the drop of a hat. Adjournments have grown like cancer corroding the entire body of the justice delivery system.” It is not for the first time that the Supreme Court has made such a comment. Earlier also, a division-bench of the apex court in January 2009 observed that many petitioners after taking ex parte stay do not care about the disposal of the cases which they ultimately lose.
Unfortunately, the lawyers of public authorities are amongst those taking undue advantage of the cancerous system of liberal adjournments and stay orders from courts on verdicts from the Central Information Commission, denying RTI petitioners their fundamental right of being informed citizenry as held by the Supreme Court in its verdict on the ‘State of Uttar Pradesh vs Raj Narain’, while elaborating the right of freedom of speech and expression as provided in article 19 (1)(a) of the Constitution. Vice President Hamid Ansari in his speech on January 7 at Gujarat National Law University in Gandhinagar also rightly criticised long-winded arguments by counsels, an aspect observed even in hearings at the CIC by public authorities represented through lawyers.
Speeches and court observations are not enough. It is time that the judiciary is held accountable at least to itself for judicial aspects by suo motu taking concrete steps so that adjournments and ex-parte stay orders may not be liberal like freebies. The CIC should be taken as role-model.
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