Gram Nyayalayas: A policy with no practice

(Authors: Pavan Kasturi[1] and Sadras Vigneshwar [2])

Gram Nyayalayas Act[3] is an Act of Parliament of India enacted in 2008 to establish Gram Nyayalayas or village courts for quick and easy access to justice in India’s rural areas. The Act went into effect on October 2, 2009. However, the Act has not been properly enforced, with only 208 functional Gram Nyayalayas in the country (as of 3 September 2019) compared to a target of 5000 such courts.

In its 114th report[4] on Gram Nyayalayas, the Law Commission of India recommended the establishment of Gram Nyayalayas at the grass-root level to provide citizens with access to justice at their doorstep and to ensure that opportunities for securing justice are not denied to any citizen due to social, economic, or other disabilities, which was also in furtherance of the mandate contained in Constitution under Art. 39-A.

Furthermore, Articles 14 and 22(1) of the Constitution require the State to ensure equality before the law and a legal structure that ensures justice based on equal opportunity for all

SUPREME COURT IN ACTION:

The Supreme Court in September 2019 agreed to hear a plea seeking a direction to the Centre and all the states to set up Gram Nyayalayas under the supervision and monitoring of the top court.

ORDER:

On February 3, 2020, the Supreme Court directed the states to establish ‘Gram Nyayalayas.’ The states had been directed to issue a notification within four weeks. Further Apex court asked the High Courts of the respective states to speed up the process of consultation with the state governments on the issue.

The ruling was delivered by an SC bench headed by Justice N V Ramana. The bench noted that some states are yet to come out with notifications for establishing the Gram Nyayalayas.

The bench also noted that though several states have issued notifications for establishing the Gram Nyayalayas, most were not functioning except in three states- Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Kerala.

The bench noted that certain states including Haryana, Gujarat, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Telangana, Odisha and Chhattisgarh have not yet filed their affidavits on the issue despite the court’s direction last year.

“We direct the aforementioned states to file their affidavits within one week from today, subject to deposit of Rs 1 lakh by each of the above-mentioned states with the Registrar (Judicial) of the Supreme Court, who shall keep the same in a separate head,”

BUT STILL NO GRAM NYAYALAYAS IN THE STATE

In regards to the above directions, the State of Telangana issued a Government order on 5th February 2020 and issued a notification to establish 55 Gram Nyayalayas in Telangana. But no serious investment has been made in terms of infrastructure & other provisions, the Resource allocation remains low or non-existent, lacks transparency and even the awareness in general among all stakeholders involved remains extremely limited.

IMPORTANCE OF GRAM NYAYALAYAS

It advances the fulfilment of Article 39A of the Constitution, which directs the state to provide free legal assistance to the poor and marginalised sections of society.
It brings justice to the people of rural India.
The emphasis on conciliation protects rural societal harmony and prevents potential enmity between the parties as a result of rigorous judicial proceedings.
The provision for summary procedures expedites the judicial process.
It relieves the burden on Taluka and District courts by providing an alternate dispute resolution mechanism mandated by law.
The ability to try both civil and criminal cases simplifies operations for mobile courts.
The ability to try both civil and criminal cases simplifies operations for mobile courts.
The emphasis on natural justice makes the platform less formal, making it easier for the rural population to cooperate and actively participate in judicial procedures.

WHY THE GRAM NYAYALAYAS ARE NEEDED?

The justice system, which is meant to uphold equality and justice, is failing to do both.
Access to justice for the oppressed and poor segments of society is a vital issue for us.
Despite ongoing attempts, access to less costly and quicker justice remains a distant hope.
The total number of cases pending in the courts is approximately 3.5 crores, with 87.5 per cent of them pending in district and subordinate courts (Economic survey 2018-19)
Delays in legal trials contribute to the already high expense of judicial procedures. The rural population, which is primarily dependent on agriculture and other manual labour, cannot afford it.

The concept of “access to justice” is an invaluable human right and also a facet of Article 21 of the Constitution. Further, the non-establishment of Gram Nyayalayas by the State of Telangana frustrates, Statutory Rights provided to citizens under the Act and the Constitutional Right of rural citizens to ‘Access to Justice’ under Article 14 and Article 21 of the Constitution of India.

In Anita Kushwaha v. Pushap Sadan[5]. The Hon’ble Supreme Court held that:

(1) accessibility to adjudicatory mechanism in terms of distance,
(2) speedy justice, and
(3) affordable justice, are essential facets of ‘Access to Justice’.

Apex court in Brij Mohan Lal v. Union of India held that[6]: “Article 21 of the Constitution of India takes in its sweep the right to an expeditious and fair trial. Even Article 39-A of the Constitution recognizes the right of citizens to equal justice and free legal aid. To put it simply, it is the constitutional duty of the Government to provide the citizens of the country with such judicial infrastructure and means of access to justice so that every person is able to receive an expeditious, inexpensive and fair trial. The plea of financial limitations or constraints can hardly be justified as a valid excuse to avoid performance of the constitutional duty of the Government, more particularly, when such rights are accepted as basic and fundamental to the human rights of citizens.”

In D.K. Basu v. State of West Bengal^[7], the paramount importance given to the accessibility to speedy, approachable and affordable redressal has been duly noted, “The process of adjudication must be speedy. “Access to justice” as a constitutional value will be a mere illusion of justice is not speedy. If the process of administration of justice is so time-consuming, laborious, indolent and frustrating for those who seek justice that it dissuades or deters them from even considering resort to that process as an option, it would tantamount to the denial of not only access to justice but justice itself.”

Even if Gram Nyayalayas begin operations today, they will have a long way to go to control the backlog of cases pending before the Indian judiciary. The Parliamentary Standing Committee was outraged at how Gram Nyayalayas were being prevented from ushering in a revolution at the lowest levels of the Judiciary. They could easily have fulfilled the constitutionally mandated role of making justice more accessible, affordable, and attainable for Indians.

CONCLUSION

As it is famously said, Justice delayed is justice denied. Our Constitutional commitment to ensure ‘Justice’ and ‘equality’ have to be secured and protected as this is very much evident from the collective reading of Preamble, Fundamental Rights and Directive Principles of State Policy. To overcome the sense of the said inadequacy, an elaborate arrangement in the form of the Gram Nyayalaya act, 2008 was made by the parliament. Delay in this process and non-constitution of required Gram Nyayalayas by the State defeats the very object of the Act.

[1] 4th year law student from University college of Law, Osmania University

[2] 3rd year law student from University college of Law, Osmania University.

[3] “Gram Nyayalaya Act 2008 to come into effect from October 2, 2009”. Press Information Bureau. 1 October 2009.

[4] https://lawcommissionofindia.nic.in/welcome.html

[5] (2016) 8 SCC 509

[6] (2012) 6 SCC 502

[7] (2015) 8 SCC 774