10,000 pending cases

PUNE, July 19: While accident rate is soaring by the day, the victims have no solace in terms of getting early justice or compensation. T...

PUNE, July 19: While accident rate is soaring by the day, the victims have no solace in terms of getting early justice or compensation. The fact is drawn home by the number of pending cases at the Maharashtra Accident Claims Tribunal. The figure has touched an all-time high of 10,000!

The pendency, as on July 15, makes Pune the number two city after Mumbai in backlog of cases to be decided. And some cases date back to 1982-1983, though pendency increased largely after 1986. There are claimants who have died waiting for the money due to them.

8220;Pune is a central city with a lot of highways around it. This means more accidents and two courts are not sufficient to handle the pressure,8221; points out Pune Bar Council president Sureshchandra Bhosale, adding that standing instruction from the High Court specify that cases should be expedited and maximum number diverted to lok nyayalayas to bring down pendency.

8220;From July, many cases have also been dismissed if the complainant does not turn up for the hearing,8221; says Chandrashekhar Aiyyer, senior advocate in the MACT.

The, move which might bring down the number of pending cases, is not being appreciated by most advocates who feel it is the wrong approach in social legislation.

While pendency has increased, the rate of filing of cases has come down in the MACT with 1,453 cases filed in 1996 and 1,279 filed in 1997. More and more cases are being directed to lok nyayalayas, which are being looked upon as the only way out of the seemingly impossible situation. While on an average 25 judgements are delivered by the three courts per month which comes to about 250 cases a year keeping court holidays in mind, the seven lok nyayalayas held last year settled 548 cases and handed out a combined compensation of more than Rs 5 crore.

In Pune, three courts, manned by one joint district judge and two additional judges with an administration staff of 15, functional in the district court building, are sharing the responsibility of clearing accident cases. In a queer distribution of work, additional judge A S Rane is handling cases of 1989 and holding additional charge in land reference cases, joint district judge Suman Mahajan is handling cases of Pune city and additional judge Dongaonkar is handling district cases, outside the city limits, and also holding additional charge of TADA cases. 8220;The absence of full time judges has added to the pendency,8221; says Aiyyer, practising in the MACT courts.