Delhi High Court asks Centre to respond to plea for expansion of high court, infrastructural requirements

It said that the high court has a scarcity of space to accommodate more court rooms, lawyers’ chambers, modern libraries, canteens, parking, bar rooms and facilities for litigants

PTI

New Delhi, May 1

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday sought response of the Centre on a plea seeking expansion of the court, the court rooms, lawyers chambers, parking space and also for infrastructural requirements.

A bench of Acting Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Manmeet PS Arora issued notice to the Union ministries of Housing and Urban Affairs and Law and Justice and the administrative side of the high court on the petition.

The petition filed by Delhi High Court Bar Association (DHCBA) sought direction to the Centre to hand over possession of entire land of Bapa Nagar here for infrastructural needs for expansion of the high court including DHCBA by relocating the existing occupants of the residential quarters in Bapa Nagar to the newly constructed or under constructed flats under the General Pool Residential Accommodation (GPRA) scheme.

During the hearing, the bench said, “The problem is that the high court is here only. We will need the neighbouring land. We will look into this and see what we can do. We have virtually no land today with us.”

The court listed the matter for further hearing on July 31.

While the Centre was represented by standing counsel Anurag Ahluwalia, Delhi High Court’s administration side was represented by advocate Raavi Birbal in the matter.

Senior advocate Rakesh Tiku, appearing for DHCBA, urged the court to direct the authorities to take immediate steps in a time bound manner to provide additional space for infrastructural requirement and expansion of the high court, DHCBA, court rooms, lawyers chambers, parking space, record room facilities and other allied activities by redevelopment of adjacent land at Bapa Nagar at Zakir Hussain Road here.

The area has old residential quarters for the government employees.

The plea said that over the years, due to rise in litigation, the sanctioned strength of the judges of the high court has been increased to 60 and the strength of the advocates has also increased multi fold and at present, there are about 35,000 lawyers registered as members of DHCBA.

A large number of litigants representing both the sides and various other persons come to the high court in connection with their cases which are either listed or pending here and on any given working day, over 4,500 matters, apart from the regular list, are listed in the high court, it said.

“These many matters mean movement of many times that of lawyers in number and that much number of litigants and their representatives. As many as 10,000 lawyers visit the high court daily and an equal number of litigants come here to attend proceedings. Besides, there are around 6,000 court staff and security personnel present inside the high court premises on any working day,” the plea said.

It said that the high court has a scarcity of space to accommodate more court rooms, lawyers’ chambers, modern libraries, canteens, parking, bar rooms and facilities for litigants.