A day after Union Law Minister M Verrappa Moily unveiled a Vision Document to improve the justice delivery system, Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan on Sunday said the only solution was to set up more courts in the country. He was speaking at the concluding session of the National Consultation for Strengthening the Judiciary Towards Reducing Pendency and Delays here, also attended by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, where Moily presented him a copy of the draft resolution.

The CJI, in his response to the draft resolutions prepared after two days of deliberations between the executive and high court and Supeme Court judges, had only this to say: “We can’t have effective judicial system unless there are more courts.” Pointing out that at present about 15,000 district-level judges and about 700 HC judges were neeeded, the CJI called upon the government to set up more courts, which would drastically cut down the backlog of cases.

Later, Moily told mediapersons that the CJI’s request for more courts would be definitely attended to.

Explaining why judges adjourn matters, Justice Balakrishnan said every judge knew that on average, he had more than 35-40 cases to deal with on any given day. “Judges are under tremendous pressure, so whenever a request comes seeking an adjournment, the judge grants it.”

“Unless the number of courts is increased, arrears cannot be handled and justice can’t be effective,” the CJI said, adding that though family courts were established in 1984 several districts still didn’t have one. Highlighting the lack of designated CBI courts to deal with corruption matters, he concluded: “If we have adequate courts, the system would function smoothly.”

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