New Delhi: As of December 2022, India had 19 judges per million population when calculated against the sanctioned strength, and a backlog of 4.8 crore cases, the 2022 India Justice Report (IJR), informed on Tuesday.
The India Justice Report (IJR), which claimed to be India's only ranking of states on delivery of Justice in the country, was initiated by Tata Trusts in 2019, and this is the third edition.
Its Partners include the Centre for Social Justice, Common Cause, Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, DAKSH, TISS-Prayas, Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy and How India Lives, IJR's data partner. The report also said that there are encouraging improvements, but persistent lacunae as it highlighted the issue including vacancies among others.
IJR 2022, as in the first two, highlighted persistent lacunae when aggregated for an all-India picture. "Vacancy is an issue across the Police, Prison staff, Legal Aid, and the Judiciary. For 1.4 billion people, India has about 20,076 judges with about 22 per cent sanctioned posts vacant.," it stated.
IJR further stated that vacancy among High Court judges is at 30 per cent. "As of December 2022, India had 19 judges per million population when calculated against the sanctioned strength, and a backlog of 4.8 crore cases. The Law Commission had desired, as early as 1987, it should be 50 judges per million in a decade's time from then," it added.
The report said that there are only 11.75 per cent of women in the police, despite their numbers doubling in the last decade. About 29 per cent of the officer positions are vacant. The ratio of police to population is 152.8 per lakh, while the international standard is 222. Prisons are over-occupied at over 130 per cent. More than two-thirds of the prisoners (77.1 per cent) are awaiting the completion of the investigation or trial, IJR said.
It further added that most states have not fully utilised funds given to them by the Centre. Their own increase in spending on the Police, Prisons, and Judiciary has not kept pace with the overall increase in state expenditure.
"The justice system as a whole remains affected by low budgets. Except for two union territories, Delhi and Chandigarh, no state spends more than 1 per cent of its total annual expenditure on the judiciary," IJR said. (ANI)
