Senior counsel Ranjit Kumar attributes the delay in the trial of criminal cases to the poor judge-population ratio.
He points out that sanctioned strength of judges per one million population was just 13 or so judges, way below judge-population ratio in other countries. Even the apex court, in All India Judges Association case, had favoured 50 judges for one million population.
If all the 18,123 district and subordinate judiciary courts were working, then according to the Law Commission, every judge would have about 1,630 cases to deal with. But this does not reflect the true picture, as against the sanctioned strength of 18,123 district and subordinate courts, only 14,287 actually work. There are 3,836 vacancies in these courts.
The national capital alone has 155 vacancies in district and subordinate judiciary. Against the sanctioned strength of 623 district and subordinate courts, only 468 are working.
The problem is further compounded by vacancies in the offices of public prosecutor and additional public prosecutor. These functionaries are thus forced to shuttle from one court to another, causing dislocation of court work.
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