President Stresses Need To Have Judgments Translated To Regional Languages [Read Speech]

Speaking at the special convocation ceremony at the Tamil Nadu Dr.Ambedkar Law Academny, Chennai on Saturday, the President Ram Nath Kovind stressed on the need to have judgments translated into regional languages to increases access to justice.

"It is important to not only take justice to the people, but also to make it understandable to litigating parties in a language they know. Perhaps a system could be evolved whereby certified translated copies of judgements are made available by the High Courts in the local or regional language", he said.

The President recalled that he had made a similar suggestion in October 2017 while speaking at the Diamond Jubilee celebrations of the High Court of Kerala.

"A few days later I visited Chhattisgarh, where I discussed this idea with the then Chief Justice of the High Court of Chhattisgarh Justice T. B. Radhakrishnan, who now is the Chief Justice of Calcutta High Court. And within a few days, the High Court of Chhattisgarh implemented the suggestion, and since then litigants can avail translated copies of the judgments of the High Court of Chhattisgarh in Hindi", he added.

The Supreme Court is also planning to take steps to make its judgments available in regional languages.

At the function, honorary LLD degrees were conferred to former Chief Justice of India and present Kerala Governor P Sathasivam, SC judge Justice S A Bobde, and Madras HC Chief Justice Vijaya Tahilramani.

The President remarked that all three were "distinguished jurists" and congratulated the University for its decision to confer the LLD degrees on the three judges in recognition of their services.

The need to make the provision of justice speedier and affordable places a great responsibility on the lawyer community, said the President.

"Our legal system has a reputation for being expensive and for being prone to delays. There are some who tend to use and abuse the instrument of adjournments as a tactic to slow down proceedings, rather than a response to a genuine emergency. This makes obtaining justice costly for the litigant. It would be a travesty of our republican ethic if a poor person did not get the same access to the law as a rich person. The legal profession must continue to address this collectively."

"All those who serve in the legal profession – whether they are judges, lawyers, court officers and even those teaching law – have a key responsibility in ensuring the primacy of rule of law. Their work has an impact that is often wide and far-reaching. They are one of the crucial elements in the making of a just and fair society", the President added.

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