INDIAN JUDICIAL SYSTEM

The Indian Judicial System has been placed in between Westminster model (where Judiciary is rather toothless) and American model (where Judiciary is supreme). The Judiciary has in India’s independent history more often than not tipped the scales back in favor of  libertarian democracy whenever the balance has been distributed by executive nation. The Indian Judicial system is one of the oldest legal system in the world today. It is a part of inheritance India received from British after a 200 years of colonial rule. The framework of the current legal system has been laid down by the Indian Constitution and the Judicial system derives the power from it.
The Constitution of India is the supreme law of the country, the fountain source of law in India. It came into effect on 26 January 1950 and is the world’s longest written constitution.
It  not only laid the framework of the Indian Judicial system, but has also laid out the powers, duties, procedures and structures of the various branches of government at the union and state laws.
In spite India adopting the feature of Federal system, the constitution has provided for setting up a single integrated system of courts to administer both union and state laws. The Supreme court is the apex court of India followed by the High court at state level. An important feature of Indian Judicial system is that it’s a “common law system”. Indian Judicial System has adopted features of other legal systems in such a way that in do not conflict while benefiting the nation and the people. Judiciary in India act as the guardian protector of the Constitution and the Fundamentals Rights of the people.

Salient Features of Indian Judiciary:
  1.       Single and integrated Judicial System.
  2.       Independence of Judiciary.
  3.       Judiciary as the Interpreter of the Constitution.
  4.       Judicial review
  5.      High courts for each state as well as provision for joint High courts.
  6.       Supreme court as the arbiter of legal disputes between the Union and State.
  7.       Guardian of Fundamental Rights.
  8.       Separation of Judiciary from  the Executive.
  9.       Open Trial
  10.     Judicial Activism.
  11.    Public Interest Litigation system.


Problems faced by the Judicial System in India:

Beside, the Indian Judiciary System suffers from the ample problems:
  1.   Weak subordinate courts.
  2.       Low Judge strength- This is the major problem , vacant seats in many high court and       subordinate courts lead to the “delay in justice”. 
  3.      Less number of High courts- At present we have only 24 High courts including 29 states and 7 UT     which leads to “overburdening of judiciary”. 
  4.      Less use of technology. 
  5.      Lack of Transparency.
  6.       Climb up of cases.
  7.      Distant Justice
  8.      Judiciary –Legislature conflict.


Steps taken by the Government:

  •   Setting up of people’s court and Lok Adalats.
  •      Tribunals: to deal with technical matters and appeals against their orders are usually capped.
  •      Special benches like the social justice bench have been set up.
  •     Quasi judicial bodies like NHRC take some load off the judiciary.
  •    The NJAC is expected to maintain independence of judiciary.

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