Speaking at an online event organised by the Allahabad High Court to inaugurate virtual courts and ‘e-Sewa kendras’, the judge referred an initiative being launched at the Orissa High Court by Chief Justice S Murlidhar, the ‘e-custody certificate’.

“That certificate will give us all the requisite data with regard to that particular under-trial or convict, right from initial remand to the subsequent progress of each case. This will also help us in ensuring that bail orders are communicated as soon as they are made, from the place they are communicated, to the jails for immediate implementation,” Justice Chandrachud said.

Recently, Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan’s son, Aryan Khan, had spent an extra day in jail, despite being granted bail by the Bombay High Court as his release orders had not reached the bail box outside the Arthur Road Jail on time, according to jail authorities.

Highlighting on the need for a redressal system, Justice Chandrachud said, “A very serious deficiency in the criminal justice system is the delay in the communication of bail orders, which we need to address on war footing. Because this touches upon human liberty of every under-trial, or even a convict who has got suspension of sentence.”

Earlier this year, a Supreme Court bench headed by CJI N V Ramana had taken suo motu cognisance of the delay in the release of 13 prisoners from Agra Central Jail despite the court granting them bail. The bench had announced a plan to set up a system for swift and secure electronic transmission of its rulings to jail authorities so that prisoners who have been granted relief are not left waiting for a certified order copy in order to be released.

“In this age of information and communication technology, we are still looking at the skies for the pigeons to communicate the orders,” the CJI had then remarked.

In September, the apex court had given the go-ahead to implement a system for electronic transmission of its orders called FASTER (Fast and Secured Transmission of Electronic Records). “The FASTER system proposes transmission of e-authenticated copies of interim orders, stay orders, bail orders and record of proceedings to the duty-holders for compliance and due execution, through a secured electronic communication channel,” the court said.

Speaking on the importance of e-Sewa Kendras, Justice Chandrachud on Wednesday stated, “the reason we need e-Sewa Kendra is because of the digital divide in India. A large part of the population does not have personal access to computers, though of course now smartphones are proliferating even in our rural areas. But there is this great digital divide and the members of the bar are representative of society at large.”

He stated that virtual courts are equally important, highlighting that they have been set up in 12 states for adjudicating traffic challans.

“Now you can imagine that for a common citizen who has a traffic challan, to spend a day away from daily wages and to go to court to pay for the traffic challan is not productive. On the other hand, if virtual courts are dovetailed with a nationalised bank where challans can be paid electronically, it is a win-win situation for the citizen,” the judge said.

He also pushed for the incorporation of Information and Technology to remediate the issue of the large number of pending cases, noting that nearly three crore criminal cases are pending in district courts.

Justice Chandrachud added that criminal cases remain pending because the accused remain absconding, “particularly after bail is granted, and secondly, due to non-appearance of official witnesses during the course of the criminal trial for recording evidence. We can use information and communications technology here also. This is what we are working on presently in the e-committee of the Supreme Court,” he said.

— With inputs from Live Law, PTI