It has been reported in Delhi that the High Courts (HCs) have accumulated a significant number of cases exceeding 6.5 million, leading to years of delay in justice.
An example of this issue is the case of a healthcare worker from the Jhalor district, Rajasthan state. This worker, who was hired on a daily basis and whose services were terminated in 1999, filed a petition in the High Court of Rajasthan in 2004, but it has still not been heard after 22 years.
Due to this growing volume of pending cases, the Supreme Court receives a constant stream of applications. These appeals are not demanding expedited hearing for specific complaints, but rather requesting early hearing of petitions after long waits for justice. Over 15 million such cases have been pending in the High Courts for more than ten years.
The highest number of such cases is concentrated in the Allahabad High Court and the Rajasthan High Court, with backlogs of 12.5 million and 7 million, respectively. In the Allahabad High Court, each judge or bench hears an average of 150–200 cases daily, but the colossal volume of accumulated cases appears to overwhelm the capacity for judicial decision-making.
Previously, the healthcare worker from Jhalor made a similar request before a bench headed by Chief Justice Surya Kant on Wednesday. Considering the constitutional independence of the High Courts and knowing the daily list of cases before each judge, the bench led by the Chief Justice issued a standard order: 'We see no grounds for hearing the petition, but we grant the applicant the freedom to file an application for early hearing of the petition.'
The Supreme Court recognizes that it does not possess administrative supremacy over the High Courts, and according to its own ruling, the chief judges of the respective High Courts are responsible for scheduling, which prevents the Supreme Courts from dictating the order of hearing certain cases for early consideration.
Furthermore, if the Supreme Court requests a High Court to hear a case out of turn, given the number of years it has been pending, the principle of equality requires the early consideration of all similarly old petitions.
In addition to the Allahabad and Rajasthan High Courts, the Bombay High Court has the largest backlog with 6.4 million cases, followed by the Madras High Court with 5.6 million, the Madhya Pradesh High Court with 4.9 million, the Karnataka High Court with 3.3 million, and the Andhra Pradesh High Court with 2.5 million. Compared to the Bombay and Madras High Courts, the Delhi and Calcutta High Courts have relatively low volumes of cases—1.2 million and 1.9 million, respectively.