India needs 70,000 judges to clear pending cases, says chief justice

Expressing serious concern over the poor judge-population ratio in the country, the chief justice of India has said that India needs more than 70,000 judges to clear the pending legal cases.

"While the Law Commission of India in 1987 had suggested for having 44,000 judges to effectively tackle the then number of pending cases, the country today has only 18,000 judges," Chief Justice T. S. Thakur said at a legal function in the eastern state of Odisha's Cuttack town Sunday.

"Thirty years down the line we continue to work with depleted strength. If you go by the number of people that have been added to the population, we may now require more than 70,000 judges to clear the pending cases," he added.

Stressing that access to justice is a fundamental right, the chief justice said: "Shortage of judges is one of the formidable challenges the judiciary is facing now. The government cannot afford to deny the people their fundamental right."

In fact, this is not the first time that the chief justice has raised the issue of low strength of judges in the country and pleaded before the government for the appointment of more judges to clear the legal cases pending for years.

At a function in the national capital last month, where Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was also present, he got emotional and broke down while speaking about the shortage of judges in the country, saying the judiciary was stuck as 38 lakh (nearly 4 million) cases remain where they are. Endit