A Maharashtra court built for adivasi justice had no judge, twice, until the Supreme Court noticed

Following this, the Supreme Court directed that the Registrar General of the Bombay High Court take steps for “… the regular posting of a competent judge… within a period of seven days”. It was only after this hearing that the vacancy was filled. Two days later, a judge was appointed.

While officials said the process to appoint a judge had already been underway, and that these take time given the sensitivity of the post, it meant 22 days in January when the court had no judge (between 1st and 22nd). And Court records show that the January vacancy was not an isolated instance.

The same court, inaugurated in 2023 by the then Supreme Court Justice Bhushan R Gavai with the promise of bringing justice closer to 725 villages in Maoist-affected, adivasi-dominated talukas, had earlier also remained without a judge for nearly three months in 2025, effectively suspending trials, bail hearings and routine judicial work.

When a judge finally took charge on July 22, 2025, he found more than 200 undertrial cases pending, many of them involving accused who had been in jail for years. “This court has taken charge of this court on 22nd July 2025 and found more than 200 undertrials cases and several bail applications were pending, which were decided on priority,” a court order dated October 6, 2025, records.

During the three-month vacancy, trials could not proceed. Accused were not produced from jails for hearings. Lawyers were forced to travel to Gadchiroli, over 120 km away, where an additional charge of the Aheri court had been assigned to a judge. Undertrials even wrote from jail to the Gadchiroli court and the Bombay High Court, seeking transfer of their cases as proceedings had come to a standstill.

Court records show that without a full-time judge, only urgent bail applications and pleas seeking extension of time to file chargesheets were taken up by in-charge courts. In one case, an accused arrested in 2020 sought bail citing that despite charges being framed in 2023 on Supreme Court directions, no witness had been examined till July 2025. In another, an accused remained in jail for over a year because he could not furnish a surety of Rs 30,000, and was released only in August 2025 — after a judge was appointed.

The bar association also took up the matter then. Rajendra Prasad Menganwar, president of the Aheri Bar Association, told The Indian Express that the reason for setting up the court in Aheri was to ensure that litigants and lawyers did not have to travel up to 200 km for a court hearing. “In 2025, when there was no appointment for three months, we would go to the Gadchiroli court for urgent hearings… We then met the administrative authorities of the Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court seeking that the vacancy be filled… Thankfully, it was done immediately.”

Officials of the court pointed out that the court has several crucial cases on its rolls involving the UAPA, linked to alleged Maoist activities, and hence judicial appointments required careful scrutiny. That was one reason for the careful consideration before the choice of a judge, they said.

An email sent to the Bombay High Court on the delay in appointment did not receive a response.

The Aheri court had fulfilled a demand going back to at least 2008, to bring courts closer so that litigants, accused and victims did not have to travel long distances through Maoist-affected forest roads with poor connectivity and irregular transport, often requiring overnight stays, just to attend routine hearings.

A magistrate court was inaugurated in 2015, followed by the Sessions Court in July 2023.

At the inauguration, Gavai had said the court would help deliver justice to 725 villages across Aheri, Mulchera, Sironcha, Bhamragad and Etapalli talukas, noting that Gadchiroli’s size and terrain made travel to the district headquarters difficult. “…justice system has come to the doorsteps of the tribals in Gadchiroli,” he had said.