The Hindu : New Delhi News : Karunanidhi: introduce Tamil as language in Madras High Court

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Karunanidhi: introduce Tamil as language in Madras High Court

Special Correspondent

Seeks approval of the Assembly resolution

Orders for setting up of 56 Evening
Courts in State issued
Massive programme to provide infrastructure to courts

New Delhi: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi has requested the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Union Law Minister H.R. Bhardwaj and Chief Justice of India K.G. Balakrishnan to approve the State government’s proposal to introduce Tamil as the language of the Madras High Court.

In his speech (read out by State Law Minister Durai Murugan) at the conference of the Chief Ministers of various States and Chief Justices of High Courts on Saturday, Mr. Karunanidhi said “we will be grateful for expeditious approval of the resolution in our State Legislature and duly recommended by the Governor.” He said Tamil Nadu had always been according high priority to fulfil the needs of judiciary, in terms of infrastructure, staff and modernisation. “We all have a common concern for the huge backlog of cases pending in various courts spread across the country. Several steps have been initiated in the past to reduce the pendencies and to dispose of the cases faster. However, the number of litigations pending in Tamil Nadu as on December 31, 2007 is nearly 5 lakhs civil cases and 4.30 lakh criminal cases in subordinate courts.”

Pending cases

In the High court, he said over 3.9 lakh civil cases and 36,000 criminal cases were pending. He said Tamil Nadu had issued orders for setting up of 56 Evening Courts in the State and 37 of them that started functioning had been able to dispose of 57,322 cases.

He said the State had taken up a massive programme for provision of infrastructure to courts at all levels at a cost of Rs. 300 crore in the next four years. The Chief Minister said for 2008-2009, the State had committed to allocate Rs. 100 crore towards provision of infrastructure facilities for courts.

He said Tamil Nadu had been in the forefront in Alternate Dispute Redressal mechanisms and Rs. 13.34 lakh had been sanctioned for strengthening Mediation and Conciliation centres in 2007-2008.

The Tamil Nadu State Legal Services Authority had been able to settle nearly 30,000 cases out of court including 11,238 cases of family disputes. He expressed the hope the conference would lead to meaningful results in the form of ensuring speedy and effective justice to the citizen.

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