SC’s New Courtroom Set-Up Creates Chaos On Reopening Day

The Supreme Court on Monday witnessed a chaotic situation on its reopening day after the long summer vacation, as lawyers and litigants were utterly confused because of new arrangements of courtrooms.

The apex court is yet to be completely paperless as in most of the courtrooms, the terminals for the judges were not yet operational.

The judges had to depend on bulky files to conduct proceedings. The technical arrangements for the lawyers are also to be done.

To decongest the courtrooms, new courts have been created -court Nos. 6 and 8 - are set up on the first floor but court Nos. 7 and 9 are on the second floor. Even court No. 12 has also got a new look, which was not appreciated by the lawyers.

The arrangements made to direct the lawyers to the new courtrooms were also not very much helpful.

Some senior lawyers faced difficulties to climb stairs to attend their cases as the lifts were not operational for lawyers so far.

A senior woman lawyer, who has breathing problem, found it difficult to use stairs, but she is hopeful that the issues will be addressed soon.

The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) has released a layout of the new courtrooms, but it was late.

Talking to LiveLaw, SCBA president RS Suri said even the bar was informed about the new set-up very late and there was no time left to release the layout in advance.

"We were informed about the new courts last evening. We issued the layout this morning,” he said. He found it as teething problem.

He said new courtrooms were big and could accommodate more people, but they should be user friendly. There is an immediate need for the lifts to be operational, at least for very senior lawyers.

Questioning the look of courtroom 12, the lawyers feel the pillars inside the court room give it an unaesthetic look. Even there is no AC in the waiting area.

"In this humid season, it was very much suffocating as there is no AC in the waiting area. Even the courts are facing to each other. It was very hard to enter the court room at 10.30 am," a lawyer, who had a case in court No. 7, said.

Former bar secretary Aishwarya Bhati told LiveLaw: "The solution is worse than the problem. The narrow passages leading to new courtrooms are creating more problems. It needs to be better organised."