Madras High Court Judge D. Bharat Chakraborty Photo Credit: Special Arrangements
Madras High Court Judge D. Bharat Chakraborty has drawn up Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) to help ensure disposal of more cases to prevent unnecessary adjournments and avoid wastage of court time.
As the lawyers usually mention cases to each other in all courtrooms at the beginning of the working hours and list them for hearing, the judge has made it clear that there is no need for the initial list of new cases to be mentioned anymore. If they are urgent.
The judge has informed the lawyers that they can get motion slips directly from their court officer and submit them to the registry to move the lunch motion and list new cases the next day. “The court trusts that bar members will apply their minds objectively and take slips only in appropriate cases,” the SOP read.
As far as speedy listing of pending cases is concerned, the judge has kept a register in his court hall to mention the case numbers that the lawyers want to be listed for speedy hearing and all those cases will be listed soon. Possible, preferably Thursday and Friday.
The judge also emphasized that he would not entertain cases listed for the day for adjournment early in the morning and that adjournment could be requested only after the case was reached. If the lawyer is not present when the case arrives, the case will be closed, the judge said.
Clarifying that all passed cases will be taken up after lunch break at 2:15 pm on working days, the judge also said that advocates can address the court in any dignified manner, and they are not required to use dignified manners. ‘My Lord’ and ‘Your Lordship’.
‘Lawyers must communicate with each other’
Justice Chakraborty said in the SOP that the adjournment cannot be made on the ground that the petitioner’s counsel has not submitted the case documents to the respondent’s counsel. He said the lawyers should communicate with each other properly and get the documents.
Alternatively, they can also obtain hard copies of the case papers from the court officer, or soft copies if any additional copies are available in the case bundle. “These cases cannot be presented in court and no adjournment will be granted on that basis,” the SOP said.
It finally told lawyers that they could submit to a court official or law clerk the citations they wanted to rely on in their cases, and that the court would try to digitally access copies of those decisions, even before commencement. of the hearing.
published – Dec 18, 2024 01:17 pm IST