Times of India

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August 22nd, New Delhi

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Today the government announced plans to radically increase spending on the judiciary. The starting salary for a District Court Magistrate First Class will be raised to 11 lakh annually. This comes on the heels of a recent dramatic increase from 3.3 lakh to 9.3 lakh last year. This has led to progress with the number of District judges increasing from around 16,000 in 2016 to over 19,000 last year. However, five thousand vacancies remain open.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Law and Justice commented, “Since 2016 we have made a concerted effort to close the gap between the sanctioned and actual number of court justices. High wages help attract more candidates. This is an important step towards building an Indian legal system that can meet the needs of the Indian people and the Indian economy.”

The Indian Bar Council also approved of the move with their spokesman quoted as saying, "This actions has been a long time coming. Kids fresh out of law school were making more than the men and women serving our country. We are glad to see a move to rectify this situation and advocate for even more action to encourage bright young lawyers to pursue public service."

However, some argue that the move is not enough and that action must be taken to increase the productivity of Judges at all levels. Many also complain that this does little to help fill the 397 vacancies on the High Courts, a contentious issue as control over the appointment of appeals judges has always been a contentious issue between the Supreme Court and elected politicians.

Confronted with these questions the Law and Justice Ministry's official comment is “The beauty of the change is that it not only provides more candidates, but better candidates as well. These high quality lawyers will serve the Indian people as effective Judges for years to come. Additionally, the raise in compensation will make the value of the job much higher, decreasing the willingness of judges to risk abandoning their duties and significantly altering the cost benefit analysis of corruption in the favor of the Indian people. This will also help fill vacancies in the High Court, where qualified candidates have been difficult to come by. The increase in the quality of District judges will naturally result in the Supreme Court more easily finding qualified candidates for the High Courts in the future.”

The government also stated that around the same time it will be mandating that the High Courts and District Courts report judicial strength based on the National Court Management Systems. While the Supreme Court and Centre have often been at odds with each other on the topic of judicial reform, this is one of a few issues on which they stand united with the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court publicly endorsed the National Court Management Systems, yet only 2 of 18 High Courts participated. This unification of methodology in calculating judicial strength will greatly increase the ability of the Ministry of Justice and Law to direct funds and policy towards the courts most in need.

The financial cost is expected to be heavy. The increase in raises for existing judges, wages for new judges, support staff, and expanded facilities are expected to cost 925 crore annually. This represents a 28% increase over the budget from last year. Additionally, 50 crore are expected as a one time expense to prepare facilities for the increase in judges. An additional 25 crore will be set aside to be used for incentives for judges to move to states where they are most needed as there is gross imbalance between the severity of the need for judges between the states with some reaching their sanctioned limits while many struggle to reach half their sanctioned strength. However, the Centre remains confident that this investment in India’s judiciary will pay off.

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[M]Milestone Corruption

1,000 crore is about $135 million

Sources: https://www.indiabudget.gov.in/

https://vidhilegalpolicy.in/blog/why-only-filling-judicial-vacancies-wont-decrease-pendency/