Judiciary at crossroads, needs serious thinking to set things right

Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council Member Sanjeev Sanyal’s controversial statement describing India’s judicial system as the single biggest hurdle in the country’s journey towards ‘Viksit Bharat’ has stirred up a hornet’s nest among members of the judicial fraternity.

While some lawyers wrote to Attorney General R Venkataramani seeking his consent to initiate contempt of court proceedings against Sanyal, Supreme Court Bar Association president Vikas Singh termed his statement as “irresponsible” and “very immature”, reflecting a lack of understanding of courts’ functioning. “The greater part of the ills in the system are actually because of the government,” Singh alleged.

Addressing the ‘Nyaya Nirmaan 2025’ conference, Sanyal pointed out that India has a two-decade window of demographic dividend that needed to be exploited to realise the goal of ‘Viksit Bharat’. Highlighting slow dispute resolution and weak enforcement of contracts as problem areas, he said policymakers were being forced to over-engineer regulations because of these reasons.

“I’ve really come here to beseech my fellow citizens that you from the legal profession really pull up your socks. Because we are waiting for you to really push for this,” Sanyal said.

If not irresponsible, Sanyal’s statement is certainly provocative for the judiciary which is used to a certain degree of deference from the other two organs of the State and the media that often spares it harsh criticism even in deserving cases.

But the judiciary needs to have a reality check before reacting to such statements. According to the National Judicial Data Grid, India has more than 5.33 crore cases pending in various courts across the country. The bulk of judicial arrears was in subordinate courts which have a total of 4,69,02,371 cases (3,58,96,857 criminal and 1,10,05,514 civil) awaiting disposal. The 25 high courts have 63,68,101 cases (44,58,601 civil and 19,09,500 criminal cases) pending while the Supreme Court has 88,952 cases, including 273 Constitution Bench matters, pending.

Besides, there are millions of other disputes pending in quasi-judicial fora such as tribunals and consumer courts.

The situation is compounded by the fact that quite a good number of sanctioned posts of judges in high courts and subordinate courts remained vacant. As on September 1, 2025, as many as 330 posts of judges out of the total sanctioned strength of 1,122 judges in 25 high courts were vacant. Similarly, 5,262 posts of judges in subordinate courts remained vacant against a sanctioned strength of 25,741 judges as on December 31, 2024.

In 1987, the Law Commission in its 120th report recommended that India should have 50 judges per million people (as against 21 judges today). It’s nothing compared to the US or the European Union where the figure stands at 150 and 220 judges per million people, respectively.

Facts and figures put the judiciary at crossroads. It can’t blame the government for huge vacancies as appointments remain in their own hands, notwithstanding occasional stand-offs on certain appointments in the Supreme Court and high courts.

A 2012 report of National Court Management Systems has projected that the number of cases being filed would reach 15 crore by 2042, requiring 75,000 judges. With the income and educational profile of Indians changing for the better, the number of litigation is bound to rise – creating further burden on the existing judicial infrastructure and human resource.

Instead of finding fault with Sanyal’s statement, the judiciary should thank him for the plain-speaking. It’s time for a serious introspection to set things right.