Govt frittering time over setting up more family courts: HC

Mumbai: The Maharashtra government got an earful from the Bombay High Court on Thursday for failing to set up a sufficient number of family courts in the state and asked it to provide infrastructure and take further steps.

Expressing displeasure, a bench of Acting Chief Justice (ACJ) SV Gangapurwala and Justice SG Chapalgaonkar said the state is “whiling away time” through correspondence between its departments and courts instead of addressing the issue.

The HC was hearing a PIL filed by Mr Tushar Gupta, a businessman studying law, through advocate Meenaz Kakalia, stating that as per the provisions of the Family Courts Act, there should be at least one  court for every city with a population of over one million.

Government pleader PP Kakade said that the HC’s Registrar-General should also be added as a respondent to the plea because family courts are to be established in consultation with the HC administration. The court had earlier directed the state to constitute family courts in every district.

Mr Kakade submitted that the HC administration should inform what kind of space would be required for judges and court staff. ACJ Gangapurwala said, “You (government) want the HC to say whether land is available or not? It should be the other way round. You should provide the infrastructure.”

Mr Kakade then said that various government departments were considering nearly 30 proposals to set up family courts, including 17 in Mumbai, four in Pune and five in Nagpur. He added that the establishment of family courts involved proposal submission by the HC, the law department’s primary scrutiny, the finance department’s scrutiny and approval and other departments’ further examination and approval.

The bench quipped: “When steps are not to be taken, correspondence is engaged in. This is only to while away time. You provide the infrastructure. We will see that family courts are housed there. Some further steps have to be taken.”  

The judges said they want to know “genuine steps” taken by the government about the status of the various proposals to set up family courts and not correspondence on the next date of hearing on January 12.

According to Mr Gupta, he received a reply in an RTI stating that over 5,000 divorce cases had been pending in Mumbai alone and that there were only seven family court judges in the city. As per the 2011 census, six more judges were required.

Proposal to set up…

17 courts in Mumbai

4 in Pune

5 in Nagpur

What’s Required

Proposal submission by the HC

Law dept’s primary scrutiny

Finance dept’s scrutiny and approval

Examination and approval by other depts