Introduction
In October 2019, ‘the India Justice Report 2019’ was released by the Tata Trusts, prepared in collaboration with the Centre for Social Justice, Common Cause, the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative, Daksh, Tiss Prayas, and Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy. The report is the first of its kind. Based on publicity available data from different government entities and the judiciary, namely, National Crime Record Bureau, Bureau of Police Research and Development, the National Judicial Data Grid, and the National Legal Services Authority, etc., this is the first-ever ranking of Indian States on justice delivery. The study ranked the states on their capacity to deliver justice to citizens.
The report puts Maharashtra as the best among 18 large and mid-sized states while Goa leads the 7 small states so far criminal justice system is concerned. According to the report, Uttar Pradesh and Tripura fared worst in both the cetegories large and mid-sized states and small states.
The report clustered and ranked states on the basis of population into 18 large and mid-sized states (10 million and above) and 7 small states (less than 10 million). Though the data encompasses all states and UTs, 4 states, where AFSPA is in force and Jammu and Kashmir are not ranked in this report.
The Act examines the four pillars of justice system, namely, police, prison, legal aid, and judiciary under six main themes—budgets, infrastructure, human resources, workload, diversity, and five-year trends.
Salient Features of the Report
The salient features of the report are as follows:
(i) The report is a path-breaking endeavour, which aims to strengthen the efforts of individuals and organisations, working towards the improvement of the Indian justice system.
(ii) It draws attention towards two important areas—access to justice and the health of our institutions responsible for justice delivery system.
(iii) The report conveys a message of caution, stressing how various actors function in the justice system.
(iv) It is an in-depth evaluation and brings to light several systemic faults.
(v) It also lays stress on the fact that any light from outside the system is not only unwelcome, but is generally considered as an intrusion to the functioning of the state machinery.
Key Findings of the Report
(i) Police Policing is a must for the safety and security of the Indian citizens, struggles with various vacancies left unheeded in the ranks of the constabulary and officers. Our police force is fromed with two distinct cadres—the State Police Service and the Indian Police Service.
Tamil Nadu ranks the highest in policing, with a score of 6.49. Scores for Uttar Pradesh and Bihar are 2.98 and 4.28 respectively, which is quite worrisome. The police have a vacancy of up to 23 per cent. As per the Padmanabhaiah Committee on Police Reforms, there is a 1:4 ratio between higher officials and the constabulary. Women make up for only 7 per cent. The report also flags the lack of diversity among the transgender community, religious minorities, etc., in the police force. As for police-to-population ratio, there are vast differences. In some states and union territories, a single police station covers up to 852 sq km. In urban districts, the area covered is below 20 sq km. These factors make justice inaccessible to many.
(ii) Prison Jail occupancy is 114 per cent. About 67.7 per cent of the prison population consists of undertrials, which is a matter of great concern. On the one hand, there is Chhattisgarh and Uttar Pradesh where prison occupancy stands at a staggering 222.5 per cent and 208 per cent respectively; it is mere 20.5 per cent in Nagaland. Prisons are unsafe, dirty, and unrehabilitative.
State governments do not have prisons on the priority list. Prison expenditure is very low, though state expenditures have increased year after year. Only seven states and UTs have used their entire budget for prisons. Other factors which mar the prison management include low salaries, lack of promotional opportunities, long working hours, work load, and high vacancies. Uttar Pradesh is among the four states with no vacancy at the correctional staff level. The Justice Mulla Committee on Jail Reforms had suggested an All India Prison Services in 1980–83 with appropriate job requirements, sound training, and proper promotional avenues.
(iii) Legal Aid As per the report, about 80 per cent Indians are eligible for legal aid, whereas only 15 million people could access it since 1995. There are uneven organisational practices in the delivery of legal services across districts and sub-divisions. Many states like Chandigarh, Gujarat, Tripura, Telangana, and West Bengal, etc., have not yet established District Legal Services Authorities (DLSAs) in all their judicial districts. There is an apparent uneven distribution of para-legals as well. Some 22 out of 36 atates and Union Territories average less than 10 Para-legal Volunteers (PLVs) per one lakh population. PLVs serve as the bridge between people and the legal-aid system.
Gender diversity is also an issue. Of 63,759 panel lawyers and 69,290 paralegal volunteers, only 18 per cent are women. Kerala ranks the highest with 40 per cent, followed by Karnataka (30 per cent), Maharashtra (27 per cent), whereas Uttar Pradesh, Odisha, and Rajasthan—all have less than 10 per cent. Every jail must house a legal service clinic. Punjab has 32 clinics in 26 jails, Chhattisgarh has 34 in 30 prisons, whereas Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, and Maharashtra have less than half the number of clinics required.
As for funds, six states and UTs had no funds allocated from their budgets. On the other hand, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Nagaland, and Tripura saw less than 20 per cent funds by their governments.
(iv) Judiciary The existence of a well-functioning judiciary is essential to maintaining the rule of law, social cohesion, and sustainable development. The report suggests that the Supreme Court had proposed the constitution of the National Court Managemnt System (NCMS) in 2012, highlighting the lack of training among judicial officers to assist in the budgeting process.
India spends 0.08 per cent of its budget on the judiciary except Delhi (1.9 per cent), all other states and UTs spend less than 1 per cent on their judiciary. Another reason is the vacant posts, which were not filled for a long time. Gender diversity is also wide. Except Tamil Nadu, no other state or UT has a high number of women judges at the high courts. In Tamil Nadu, the number of women judges exceeds the 35 per cent quota in the subordinate courts.
Recommendations of the Report
The India Justice Report 2019 makes the following recommendations:
(i) Ensure a cost-benefit analysis that qualifies the cost of increasing human resources against the economic price of failing to address registered crime, disorder, incarceration, and judicial delay caused by high workloads and inadequate manpower. Based on this analysis, fill vacancies on an urgent footing.
(ii) When filling vacancies, ensure that the representation of women, SCs, OBCs, STs, and religious minorities is increased to assure that the make-up of the justice system reflects the diversity on the society it serves.
(iii) Increase the availability of justice services in rural areas so as to reduce the present disparity in accessing justice that exists between rural and urban populations. This includes prioritising the availability of trained lawyers and paralegals across poorly served areas.
(iv) Ensure budgetary allocations to every segment of the justice system (particularly judiciary and prisons). Keep pace with increase in costs.
(v) Each pillar must have open systems to periodically review performance, identify issues that must be tackled, arrive at short-term and long-term plans of actions through a consultative process with experts and key stakeholders, closely monitor the implementation of the plan, and regularly report on the activities it undertakes.
(vi) Improve transparency all the way through the justice system by ensuring the publication of verified, accurate, and timely data that is seamlessly serviceable for informing policy and practice across governance.
(vii) Ensure that periodic empirical research is sanctioned by the government to be undertaken in an independent manner.
The Participants in the Report
The following organisations took part in preparing this report, produced by the Tata Trusts which was founded in 1892 by Jamsetji Tata. The trust is one of the oldest philanthropic institutions in India and has played a key role in changing traditional ideas of charity.
(i) Centre for Social Justice (CJI) is an organisation fighting for the rights of the marginalised and the vulnerable, particularly in the field of access to justice. It has been active in more than eight states across India, creating human rights interventions, using law as a key strategy in engaging with grassroot realities.
(ii) Common Cause is particularly known for the difference it has made through a large number on public interest litigations (PILs) like cancellation of entire telecom spectrum, allocation of coal blocks, and the Apex Court’s recognition of an individual’s right to die with dignity.
(iii) DAKSH is a civil society organisation based in Bengaluru and works on judicial reforms at the intersection of data science, public policy, and operations research. Primarily, it is focused on the Rule of Law project to evaluate judicial performance.
(iv) Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) is an independent, non-profit international non-governmental organisation which works for human rights. It draws attention to the progress and setbacks to human rights in commonwealth countries.
(v) Prayas is a social work demonstration project of the Centre for the Criminology and Justice, Tata Institute of Social Sciences. It is focused on service delivery, networking, training, research, and documentation.
(vi) Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy is an independent think-tank doing legal research to make better laws and improve governance for the public good. It engages with ministries and departments of the Indian government and collaborates with other relevant stakeholders within public institutions, civil society members, etc. In the field of legal reforms also, the Centre undertakes, freely disseminates independent research critical to the future of the country.
Some Critical Observations
- Kerala has the least vacancies across police, prisons, legal aid, and judiciary.
- Gujarat is the only state to reduce vacancies over five years in police, prison, and judiciary.
- There are 151 police persons per 1 lakh people in India.
- Almost all the prisons in the country are over-occupied.
- About 75 paise per annum are spent for free legal aid with no state to have fully utilised National Legal Services Authority (NALSA) budget.
- About 25 per cent posts are vacant in the high court of each state; 4.5 per cent vacancies in subordinate courts in Maharashtra, 52 per cent in Mizoram, i.e., 1 subordinate court judge for over 50,000 people in India. Four thousand courts are short against the number sanctioned.
- About 28 million cases are pending in subordinate courts.
- There is only 621 correctional staff for 1,412 prisons.
- Some 67.7 per cent of prison population was facing trials in 2016.
- Women participation in police is only 7 per cent of 2.4 million police persons.
- Tamil Nadu topped in policing, with a score of 6.49 out of 10, followed by Bihar (3.77) and Uttar Pradesh (2.98).
- Kerala topped in matters of prisons also with a score of 7.18, followed by Jharkhand (3.46), Uttarakhand (3.72), Punjab (4.35), Andhra Pradesh (4.35), and Uttar Pradesh (4.42).
- In judiciary, Tamil Nadu topped with a score of 6.99, followed by Jharkhand (4.3), Uttarakhand (4.17), Karnataka (3.76), Uttar Pradesh (3.7), and Bihar (2.41).
- As regards legal aid, Kerala topped with a score of 6.58.
- No state is able to meet diversity quotas (SC, ST, and OBC) except Karnataka, which comes close to achieving diversity quotas, missing SC reservation target by 4 per cent.