The Hindu : Front Page : Bench handles record number of cases

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Tuesday, Jul 17, 2007
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Bench handles record number of cases

Mohamed Imranullah S.

To celebrate third anniversary on July 24
Disposes of 32,163 cases in the last six months

MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court is gearing up to reach its third anniversary on July 24.

The third year of its functioning has been the most successful with the Bench disposing of a record number of 32,163 cases in the last six months.

Significantly, the disposal was proportionate to filing of cases with only the cases transferred from the principal seat in Chennai pending adjudication.

This had been made possible with the allotment of as many as 11 Judges, thanks to initiative taken by the Chief Justice Ajit Prakash Shah.

There were 10,344 writ petitions pending as on December 31, 2006. Another 6,102 writs were filed from January 1 to July 13 and the Bench disposed of 6,469 in the period, bring down the pending cases to 9,977.

Similarly, 298 out of 324 habeas corpus petitions filed during the same period have been disposed of.

In criminal original petitions, which include bail and anticipatory bail, the figure stood at 2078 last year.

This year, 6,678 petitions were filed and 6,779 were disposed of with only 1,977 petitions pending.

The High Court Bench disposed of 647 criminal appeals from the start of this year and still 3,420 appeals are pending.

However, there has been a slump in clearance of second appeals. It has gone up to 9,953 at present, from 9,866 that were pending as on December 31.

Lawyers’ performance

“The performance of Madurai lawyers has improved a lot on the civil and criminal side.

“They are yet to pick up on the writ side,” said a senior jurist.

In order to encourage the advocates here, D. Murugesan, Judge, had recommended to the Chief Justice to confer senior counsel status on a couple of lawyers.

Accordingly, two of them were conferred with the status to inspire young legal practitioners.

There had been a significant increase in the disposal during the tenure of Justices M. Chockalingam, K. Chandru, G. Rajasuria and S. Nagamuthu.

During the initial days of the establishment of the Bench, the lawyers here were engaging senior counsels from Chennai.

Of late, Madurai lawyers, who have gained in confidence to appear before the Bench, are preferred.

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