TABLE OF CONTENTS- 1

Digital Courts
Vision & Roadmap
e-Courts Project Phase III

E-Committee, Supreme Court of India

2022
ABOUT THE E-COMMITTEE

The e-Committee of the Hon’ble Supreme Court was established in 2004 via an
order of the Ministry of Law and Justice in pursuance of a proposal received from
the then Chief Justice of India. The e-Committee is the governing body charged
with overseeing the e-Courts Project conceptualized under the “National Policy
and Action Plan for Implementation of Information and Communication
Technology (ICT) in the Indian Judiciary-2005”. The e-Courts project is a pan
India initiative monitored and funded by the Department of Justice, Ministry of
Law and Justice, Government of India.

The e-Committee has evolved in terms of its roles and responsibilities over the
last 15 years. At present, the objectives that e-Committee seeks to achieve are:
interlinking of all courts across the country; ICT enablement of the Indian judicial
system; enabling courts to enhance judicial productivity, both qualitatively and
quantitatively and to make the justice delivery system accessible, cost-effective,
transparent and accountable.

The Chief Justice of India is the Patron in Chief of the e-Committee. The e-
Committee is chaired by Dr. Justice D.Y. Chandrachud, Judge, Supreme Court of
India. Former judge of the Bombay High Court, Justice R.C. Chavan is the vice-
chairperson of the committee. There are four other members who are part of the
e-Committee.

In June 2020, the e-Committee constituted a subcommittee of experts from

Agami, DAKSH and Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy to envision Phase III of e-
Courts Project.
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ................................................................... 1

ABBREVIATIONS ............................................................................. 8

GLOSSARY ..................................................................................... 10

THE JOURNEY SO FAR .................................................................. 13

I. Achievements ........................................................................................................................ 14

II. Challenges ............................................................................................................................. 18

LEARNINGS AND THE OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION .................... 21

VISION FOR PHASE III .................................................................. 27

CORE VALUES OF DIGITAL COURTS............................................. 31

BENEFITS FOR STAKEHOLDERS .................................................. 35

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS ........................................................ 39

I. Process Re-engineering ........................................................................................................ 41

II. The Digital Infrastructure .................................................................................................... 42

A. Benefits of Adopting a Platform Approach to Ecosystem Design ........................................ 43

B. Standards, Specifications and Certifications ....................................................................... 47

C. Principles for Development of a Digital Infrastructure and Platforms ............................... 49

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III ........................................................... 55

TABLE OF CONTENTS- I
OPERATIONALISING PHASE III .................................................... 78

I. Institutional and Governance Framework ................................................................................. 78

II. Change Management and Adoption ....................................................................................... 100

III. Procurement ........................................................................................................................... 108

IV. Sequencing............................................................................................................................... 112

V. Budgeting .................................................................................................................................. 116

VI. Monitoring and Evaluation Framework ................................................................................. 117

METHODOLOGY ...........................................................................123

SOURCES ..................................................................................... 126

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 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Phase III of the e-Courts project envisions a judicial system that is more
accessible, efficient and equitable for every individual who seeks justice, or is
part of the delivery of justice, in India.

It envisions additional infrastructure for the judicial system that is natively

digital, while improving existing physical processes. It does not merely digitise
paper-based processes, it transforms processes for a digital environment. Phase
III will enable any litigant or lawyer to file a case from anywhere, at any time,
without having to go to multiple windows in the premises of any specific court. It
seeks to create a reality in which lawyers and litigants can effectively plead their
cases with certainty of hearings, and judges are able to adjudicate fairly, through
optimal hearings: video or audio, in-person or in writing; synchronous or
asynchronous. It intends to create a system in which administrative processes
such as collection of different kinds of fees and rote applications are simplified
because technology enables it.

It seeks to put in place an intelligent system that enables data-based decision

making for judges and registries when scheduling or prioritising cases and allows
for greater predictability and optimisation of capacity of judges and lawyers.
Build a “smart” system, in which registries will have to minimally enter data or
scrutinise files owing to foundational capabilities of data connected through
leveraged technology. Design a system that integrates alternative means of
dispute resolution into the judicial process, such that they are seen as extensions
of the courts themselves. A system that combines the vast body of judicial data to
foster legal literacy and furnish information on remedies to an aggrieved person
at the click of a button. A future of macro data-driven decision making enabling

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY- 1
targeted interventions and resource allocation both on the judicial and
administrative side.

AN ECOSYSTEM APPROACH

COVID-19 has amplified the need to strengthen digital capabilities and has
provided the steppingstone to an unprecedented opportunity for change. But
such a change cannot be achieved without adopting a radically different approach
from that adopted in Phase I and II, while building on its foundations. Given the
large, diverse and constantly evolving needs of different users and the constant
evolution of technology, dispute resolution must not just remain as a sovereign
function, but evolve as a service: to mitigate, contain and resolve disputes by the
courts (in discharge of their sovereign function of justice administration) and a
range of public, private and citizen sector actors (alongside courts).

To achieve this, it is critical to adopt an ‘ecosystem approach’ that supports scale,

speed, and sustainability. Rather than focus on developing all the solutions itself,
Phase III will curate the right environment and infrastructure for solutions to
emerge rapidly from the ecosystem to create a multiplier effect for change. It can
achieve greater adoption and impact by leveraging the collective strength of the
ecosystem.

2 - EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
KEY BUILDING BLOCKS OF PHASE III

Rooted in values of trust, empathy, sustainability, and transparency, Phase III

will enable the vision and a shift to an ‘ecosystem approach’ by:

1. SIMPLIFYING PROCEDURES:

Several repetitive and routine processes designed in a pre-digital era can be

eliminated or simplified by taking advantage of digital technology to improve
efficiency. Technology can also play a more transformative role by enabling users
to perform tasks or deliver certain services that would not have been previously
possible. High Courts must prioritize process re-engineering exercises to
redesign processes to reduce costs, time and effort for users.

2. CREATING A FOUNDATIONAL DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE:

Phase III will focus on creating Digital Infrastructure and capabilities (in contrast
to services or solutions) that can facilitate the creation of an infinite number of

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY- 3
additional services / solutions. To enable interactions and exchange of data, co-
creation of services by different ecosystem actors and improve the efficiency and
intelligence of the system, it will provide open APIs (for systems to talk to each
other) and also standards, specifications and certifications that can act as
guardrails as different actors build solutions across space and time. It will design
platforms for e-filing, summons delivery, digital hearings, virtual courtrooms,
amongst others in a modular way that will enable agility to change elements
constantly based on feedback or availability of newer technologies. More
importantly, such infrastructure will enable different actors including High
Courts to configure solutions and services without needing to be uniform or
standardised.

3. PUTTING IN PLACE A NEW INSTITUTIONAL AND

GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORK:

To achieve this vision, it is important to complement the skills within the

judiciary with personnel that bring in specialised and functional skills. Towards
this, Phase III aims to set up a Digital Courts Technology Office in the short term
(which will evolve to a National Judicial Technology Council in the longer term)
that will focus on designing the Digital Infrastructure based on consultations with
all necessary stakeholders. This will include setting up of a blueprint which
includes principles, architecture, identification of building blocks, standards,
protocols and proof-of-concept studies. Such Digital Infrastructure will be
available as a public good for configuration and adoption by all actors including
High Courts. For actual development and implementation, it will procure
specialised services while being completely responsible to the judiciary for
committed deliverables and service levels. Phase III also envisions setting up of
Technology Offices at High Courts that will support the configuration and
adoption of the Digital Infrastructure, develop new services and address
grievances.

4 - EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Digital Courts (i.e., courts equipped with a foundational Digital Infrastructure
platform combined with simplified and re-engineered administrative procedural
design) can lay the foundation of a future in which digital services are widely
adopted. Such adoption will be an outcome of an evolving and open technology
infrastructure that enables the creation of solutions specifically catered to the
diverse and unique needs of lawyers, citizens, government institutions,
companies, court employees and judges.

KEY GOALS OF PHASE III

In adopting an ecosystem approach, Phase III must prioritize the following three
goals.

1. INSTALLATION OF RELEVANT HARDWARE

Basic hardware needed across courts to ensure the provision of digital services.

RELIABLE CONNECTIVITY

POWER SUPPLY

OTHER RELEVANT HARDWARE: COMPUTERS, PRINTERS & SCANNERS

2. ADOPT DATA GOVERNANCE

To balance principle of open courts and privacy & security.

3. CREATE THE DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE

These capabilities can enable the generation of many services

JUDICIAL TRUSTWORTHY DIGITAL Unique case locator (CNR) linked to every

REPOSITORIES case through data standards

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY- 5
A COMPREHENSIVE & UPDATED Freely accessible aggregator of indexed
REPOSITORY OF CASE LAW case laws with appropriate standards,
specifications & open APIs

MAKE DOCUMENTS MACHINE Adoption of OCR, smart & demat forms to

READABLE & SECURE increase the machine readability of
documents. Digital signatures &
blockchain to ensure authentication &
security

INTELLIGENT SCHEDULING Using AI to intelligently recommend

schedules for hearing by optimising &
coordinating the schedules & time of
different actors

INTEROPERABLE CRIMINAL JUSTICE Enable sharing of data between police,

SYSTEM prison, legal aid, courts etc by developing
data standards, specifications, protocols &
certifications

4. ENABLE ACCESS TO CRITICAL SERVICES

DIGITAL CASE MANAGEMENT For seamless access and exchange of documents

SYSTEMS in a secure manner by lawyers, clients, registry
and judges.

E-FILING Leverage smart forms, eliminate physical

duplications of e-filings, enable integrated
payments. Extend to private complaints before
magistrates & subsequent filings

COURTROOM LIVE AUDIO- Explore & enable different forms of digitally

VISUAL STREAMING SYSTEM enabled hearings: in person, asynchronous
hearings, online or audio-only linkages

TRANSCRIPTIONS Provide lawyers & litigants with technologically

enabled transcriptions of court proceedings from
audio or spoken format into a typed digital format
immediately with the order.

SERVICE OF NOTICE Automatically enable service on parties via email

/ SMS, where possible, with built in systems for
confirmation of receipt, proactive alerts &
integrated payments

E-SEWA KENDRA Support for litigations with limited digital access:

a help desk to call & find out information
regarding listing of their case or apply for a copy

6 - EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
 of an order/judgment to be sent by post, etc.

HELP DESK FOR ASSISTANCE IN To support lawyers and litigents who are unable
COURT AND REMOTE to access digital files

ADMINISTRATION OF LEGAL Enable more equitable and efficient allotment of

AID cases to legal aid lawyers aided by data analysis.

VIRTUAL COURTS Set up more virtual courts for proceedings such as

compounding of offences by payment of challans,
probate proceedings where no objectors enter
appearance, small cause money claims and
mutual consent divorce pleas/

Successful operationalisation of these goals of Phase III will require careful

planning around sequencing, budgeting, procurement, contract management,
adoption and change management, and a robust monitoring and evaluation
framework. This Vision Document provides the blueprint for such
operationalisation.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY- 7
 ABBREVIATIONS

No. Abbreviation Expansion

1. AI Artificial Intelligence

2. APIs Application Programming Interface

3. ATM Automated Teller Machine

4. CCTNS The Crime and Criminal Tracking Networks and Systems

5. CIS Case Information System

6. CNR Case Number Record

7. CPC(s) Central Project Coordinator(s)

8. CSCs Common Service Centres

9. DCTO Digital Courts Technology Office

10. DoJ Department of Justice

11. EPRC Empowered Process Reengineering Committee

12 FIR First Information Report

13. GPS Global Positioning System

14. HCCC High Court Computer Committee

15. ICJS Interoperable Criminal Justice System

16. ICT Information and Communication Technologies

17. IVRS Interactive Voice Response System

18. JO Code Judicial Officer Code

19. KPI Key Performance Indicators

20. NIC National Informatics Centre

21. NJDG National Judicial Data Grid

8 - ABBREVIATIONS
22. NJTC National Judicial Technology Council

23. NSTEP National Service and Tracking of Electronic Processes

24. OCR Optical character recognition/ reader

25. ODR Online Dispute Resolution

26. QR Code Quick Response Code

27. RFP Request for Proposal

28. SCI Supreme Court of India

29. UID Unique Identification Number

30. UI/ UX User Interface and User Experience

31. UPI Unified Payment Interface

ABBREVIATIONS- 9
 GLOSSARY

No. Term Definition

1. APIs Application Programming Interface is a protocol intended to be

used as an interface by software components to communicate
with each other.

2. Case Case management is a comprehensive system of management of

Management time and events in any given case as it proceeds through the
justice system, from initiation to resolution.

3. Core Module The existing Case Information Software has two functional
components- Core and Periphery. The core of the software has
all the features and functionalities with some configurable
variances, as required by the Supreme Court, Parliament, the
High Courts, the Central Government or any approved National
Agency. The core of the software is not open for customization.
The Core Module is not distributed in source code form.

4. Court A court is a room in a court complex designated for adjudication

consisting of judges, lawyers, court staff and the necessary
infrastructure for any dispute or case.

5. Court A court complex houses courts with different jurisdictions in

Complex one compound. It may have several courtrooms such as Judicial
Magistrate First Class, Second class and so on along with
District and Sessions court, etc. Each district/state has a unique
classification of courts together to form a court complex.

6. Digital Digital Courts is a foundational Digital Infrastructure combined

Courts with services and simplified re-engineered administrative
procedural design that can enhance access, amplify the existing
capacity and enable the efficiency of the overall judicial
administration system.

7. Digital The digital infrastructure is a shared underlying technological

infrastructure framework that provides the context-independent components
(such as knowledge, process, technology, connections and data)

10 - GLOSSARY
 to develop solutions/services needed for the user. It can
facilitate the creation of an infinite number of additional
services / solutions on the core platforms.

8. FOSS / Open Open source is a philosophy, or methodology that promotes free

Source redistribution and access to an end-product's design and
implementation details.

9. Master Master Trainers are judicial officers who as part of the Training
Trainers of Trainers programme are responsible for training judges,
court staff, Registry officials and lawyers on various e-Courts
initiatives.

10. Modules A module is a software component or part of a program that

contains one or more routines. One or more independently
developed modules make up a program. An institution-wide
software application may contain several different modules, and
each module serves unique and separate business operations.

11. Open Data Open data is digital data available in a format that allows it to be
reused, redistributed and built-on by anyone, anywhere, for any
defined purpose.

12. Open Open standards are standards made available to the general
Standards public which are developed (or approved) and maintained via a
collaborative and consensus driven process. They facilitate
interoperability and data exchange among different products or
services and are intended for widespread adoption.

13. Online In online courts, human judges determine cases but neither in a
Courts physical courtroom nor in a virtual hearing. Instead, evidence
and arguments are submitted through an online platform.
Judges then deliver their decisions not in open court but again
via the online service.

14. Online ODR involves resolution of disputes through technology in a

Dispute simple, fast, flexible and secure manner. ODR encompasses a
Resolution broad range of approaches and forms (including but not limited
(ODR) to ombudsmen, complaints boards, negotiation, conciliation,
mediation, facilitated settlement, arbitration and others), and
the potential for hybrid processes comprising both online and

GLOSSARY- 11
 offline elements.

15. Peripheral The functionalities and specifications of the Periphery of the CIS
Modules will be finalized locally by the High Courts (depending on their
requirements) ensuring that the Periphery Module is
compatible with core and the same will be integrated with the
Core Module.

16. Platform Platform is a model/layered method in which various entities

can interact, allowing for a resolution. It leverages a digital
infrastructure that is used as a base upon which other
applications, processes or solutions are developed.

17. Process Re- Process re-engineering is rethinking and redesigning of

engineering processes to achieve improvements in critical measures of
performance, such as cost, quality, service and speed.

18. Protocols Protocols are a set of rules or procedures put in place for
transmitting data between electronic devices.

19. Systems Systems are components built over digital infrastructure to

create services or solutions.

20. System System Assistants are officers who are responsible for providing
Assistants any technical assistance for software or hardware related issues
as part of e-Courts project at the district and High Courts level.

21. Virtual Virtual Courts is a concept aimed at eliminating the presence of

Courts litigant or lawyer in the court, allowing for adjudication of the
case online. In their ideal form, virtual courts provide for end-
to-end capability of conducting cases virtually consisting of
different modules such as online court fees, e-Filing, online
tracking of cases, virtual hearings and online delivery of
judgements and orders. In their current form as seen in
https://vcourts.gov.in, most of the above modules are enabled.
However, for adjudication purposes, the litigant may have to
appear in person or through the lawyer in the Court.

12 - GLOSSARY
 THE JOURNEY SO FAR

ACHIEVEMENTS AND CHALLENGES OF PHASE I & II

The e-Courts mission commenced in 2005 with a vision to enhance judicial

productivity both qualitatively and quantitatively, and also make the justice
delivery system affordable, accessible, cost effective, transparent and
accountable. It set in motion the processes of digitisation of the judicial
administration process across approximately 19,000 courts in India.

The scale of the project demanded the involvement of multiple levels of

government. To ensure uniformity of infrastructure in courts across India, the
design and specification of the infrastructure was centralised. At the same time
to accommodate diverse needs of courts and to enable ownership, including
selection of vendors, the implementation was decentralised. To advance Phase I
and 2, the following institutions were entrusted critical roles:

● Supreme Court e-Committee (E-Committee, SCI): responsible for the

policy planning, strategic direction, high level design and specification and
certifications

● National Informatics Centre (NIC): responsible for development of

technology and providing support to the High Courts,

● High Court Computer Committees (HCCCs): responsible for

implementing the project at the state level, and

THE JOURNEY SO FAR- 13

 ● The Department of Justice (DoJ): responsible for obtaining financial
approvals, disbursing, and monitoring utilisation of funds

A more detailed discussion of this governance structure is in the section titled

“Institutional and Governance Framework”

I. ACHIEVEMENTS

Planned and executed in two phases: Phase I and Phase II, with an overall budget
of INR 639.411 crores and 1670 crores respectively, the project has so far enabled
the creation of infrastructure, systems and services for judges, lawyers and
litigants. The following section captures some of the key achievements of Phase I
and Phase II.

A. PUBLIC INFRASTRUCTURE

a) Ensuring BSNL-MPLS WAN connectivity through optical fibre cable, with

connectivity speed of minimum 10 Mbps upto 100 Mbps depending upon
the number of functioning courtrooms in the Court Complex, to 13,606
courts.

b) Enabling solar energy backup in 242 court complexes

c) Installing hardware and software needed to support digital efforts across

approximately 13,500 courts

d) Enabling 3,477 court complexes to carry out hearings through video

conference facilities

B. SYSTEMS

a) Development of CIS based on free and open-source software for case

management.

14 - THE JOURNEY SO FAR

b) Development of a unique case number record (CNR) for each case,
essential for both processing of case related data as well as enabling
interactions with other services in relation to a case (such as video
conferencing, e-filing, tagging, or scheduling).

c) Development of a quick response code (QR code) to link with pleadings,

orders, and judgements to enable easy access to all related documents of a
particular case.

d) Creation of a judicial officer code (JO Code) to provide a unique ID for

every judge. This enables tracking of case statistics of judicial officers and
builds the capability for judicial assessment.

e) Development of national codes for case types and legislations across all
districts. This is to create back-end standardisation for diverse case
classification systems across different High Courts, to enable collation of
comparable meta-data at state and national levels.

f) Launch of the Interoperable Criminal Justice System (ICJS) to improve

transparency and effectiveness of the criminal justice system. ICJS aims
to integrate and make data interoperable between different institutions
such as police, prisons and courts involved in the criminal justice system.

g) Launch of the National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG), which makes summary
statistics of all cases across High Courts and District Courts, transparent
and accessible to all.

h) Launch of National Service and Tracking of Electronic Processes (NSTEP)

to track service of processes by bailiffs / process servers though a global
positioning system (GPS) enabled application. This is aimed at increasing
accountability and transparency in the summons service processes.

THE JOURNEY SO FAR- 15

 i) Digitisation of case records, especially old case records. This is essential to
provide a foundation and capacity for digitisation of all administrative
functions in the judiciary.

C. SERVICES

FOR LAWYERS AND LITIGANTS

a) Launch of Virtual Courts: to reduce costs and increase speed of disposal of

cases, virtual courts were set up for disputes relating to traffic challans in
various states.

b) E-seva Kendras were set up at all High Courts and one district court in
each state to improve access of information and services to litigants and
lawyers on the other side of the digital divide. It enables users to file cases
online and access court related information.

c) Information kiosks were set up at High Courts to provide access to case

information to litigants and advocates. A few examples worth highlighting
are: display boards outside the filing counters which inform a user about
filing status, defects detected etc, a mobile based application which helps
retrieve case information, and for legal aid services.

d) Launch of a free downloadable e-Courts Services App that provides easy

access and search of relevant case information (status, orders and cause
list) using the QR code.

e) Setting up systems for e-filing of pleadings and supporting documents at

High Courts and District Courts. This has enabled lawyers to file their
cases 24x7 as per their convenience.

16 - THE JOURNEY SO FAR

 f) Setting up systems to accept e-payment of court fees, fines, penalties and
judicial deposits at several High Courts to enable seamless payments
online.

g) Several District Court websites have been rolled out to disseminate all
information relating to the cases in their respective jurisdictions.

h) Launch of automated emailing systems to provide advocates and litigants

with case status, next date of hearing, cause list, orders, if the email is
registered in the system.

FOR JUDGES

a) Launch of ‘JustIS Mobile App’ for all judges in the district judiciary. It
provides details of cases in their courts along with features to support case
management such as calendaring.

b) Few High Courts have developed dashboards or e-diary for judges

indicating daily disposal in addition to other details such as pending cases,
number of judgements, etc which are available for every judge to track.

From the services and benefits highlighted above, it can be concluded that the
first two phases of e-Courts project have not only built a solid foundation for the
modernisation of the judiciary at all levels but have also allowed for innovation.
The modular services developed by individual High Courts are a testament to the
same.

In addition, the following measures were taken to create a supportive framework

for the technology systems and services that were introduced:

1. Training programmes were designed to train court masters, court staff,

advocates and their clerks, District Court judges, High Court judges,
trainee judicial officers, system administrators, and registrars to use the

THE JOURNEY SO FAR- 17

 services effectively. This was done by creating a large pool of master
trainers who in turn trained other officials through training programmes
developed by the e-Committee in coordination with state judicial
academies. Further, support for stakeholders was made available through
kiosks and e-Sewa Kendra on court premises.

2. Support materials were provided through a consolidated ‘Knowledge

Management’ tab on e-Courts website linking video tutorials on YouTube,
brochures, and user manuals. In addition, pamphlets and e-filing manuals
in regional languages were also created and uploaded.

II. CHALLENGES

While several efforts have been made to develop and enhance the use of
technology, there remain challenges in ensuring capability, integration of
technology and data, and most importantly, adoption. These challenges
enumerated below, were identified through the interactions with the members of
E-Committee, SCI and HCCCs and through an analysis of responses to the
questionnaires that were circulated to the Central Project Coordinators (CPCs),
Master Trainers and System Assistants/Officers.

AT THE BASE LEVEL, there is a network connectivity divide with some states
having good internet connection across districts, while certain district courts in
other states do not even have lease lines to provide internet. Adequate data speed
and data volume are basic needs which are not uniformly available across the
country. This creates disparity between different courts in accessing e-Courts
systems and services. This disparity is due to several reasons including poor
design of current process for budgeting, impacting the state judiciary, the
absence of a centralised procurement agency and standardised specifications. In
addition, there is a perceptible disparity amongst end-users, i.e. lawyers and
litigants, in their ability to access devices such as smartphones, laptops or tablets
that enable usage of e-Courts facilities.

18 - THE JOURNEY SO FAR

In terms of capacity building for e-Courts, additional staff hired for this project
or deployed full time to it were inadequate impacting the digitisation efforts.
CPCs have highlighted that this has resulted in over-burdening of the existing
staff. Another challenge affecting capacity building is the lack of focused and
intensive training to fully utilise the various modules of e-Courts. All primary
users including CPCs, Master Trainers and System Assistants have called
attention to the need for a continuous programme for technical and advanced
training for all stakeholders.

AT THE DEVELOPMENT LEVEL, the federal structure of the judiciary where

each High Court has complete independence to devise its own administrative
rules and procedures, has resulted in diversity in practices. For instance, there is
no uniformity in case nomenclatures across courts, which poses a critical
challenge to developing a unified data system that can enable analysis of meta
data across courts. Further, stakeholders highlighted how every High Court has
its own customised forms, processes and even captcha for websites. While
technology needs to account for diversity in administrative and legal processes,
the same must be built over a capacity to unify for the success of a nationwide
project such as e-Courts.

AT THE ADOPTION LEVEL, due to shortcomings in undertaking process re-

engineering exercises, technology integration has placed additional burden on
the end-users, especially the registry officials. For example, in many courts the
registries still need to maintain physical registers, lawyers still need to file
physical copies of their e-filed cases, or bailiffs using NSTEP need to still file
physical reports. The issue of lack of functional specialisation has been elaborated
further in the section titled “Institutional and Governance Framework”

Further, as gathered from the System Administrators, there are limited

frameworks available for organised feedback resulting in various stakeholders
remaining alienated from the system and being passive users. This lack of
feedback loop and engagement with the end-users has adversely affected
adoption.

THE JOURNEY SO FAR- 19

As a result of these challenges, technology has not been harnessed to its full
potential. This has created mind-set barriers against technology solutions and
services. Further, due to shortcomings in dissemination of information or lack of
usability of certain solutions, most litigants and lawyers are not aware of the
range of e-Courts services they can avail. As such, and concomitantly due to the
unpredictable nature of technological development, the development of e-Courts
has not followed the trajectory charted in 2005. Next, we discuss learnings from
the previous phases with an outlook to build on them.

20 - THE JOURNEY SO FAR

 LEARNINGS AND THE
OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION

Phase I and Phase II have generated critical learnings that can help realise the
full potential of the e-Courts project. It is central that Phase III of the project
builds on these learnings:

ADOPT AN ‘ECOSYSTEM’ APPROACH

Reflecting on the evolution of the e-Courts project over the years, a clear shift in
strategy in each phase becomes visible. It also becomes apparent that each phase
adopted a strategy that reflected the dominant approach for government
technology at that time.

Phase I largely focused on procuring and installing hardware and network

connectivity, digitising case records and operationalising the national e-Courts
portal (http://www.ecourts.gov.in) with limited online services to users such as
details of case registration, cause list, case status, daily orders, and final
judgments. In this phase, the focus of technology was primarily to address the
needs of the judiciary and registry. Most services for citizens remained offline.

Phase II shifted to focusing on the needs of the litigant. And this was achieved by
the creation of ‘monolithic systems’: the development of an end-to end
digitisation system (such as CIS), portals that enable citizens to access
information (NJDG) or systems for delivery of services (e-filing, e-payments etc).
While this made significant progress, it has revealed three limitations. First,

LEARNINGS AND THE OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION- 21

while the design of such monolithic systems served the immediate needs of a
user, the process of adapting and revising their design as per evolving needs of
users was expensive and difficult to do without disrupting existing services. As a
result, revisions were typically postponed until they could be done
simultaneously as part of a periodic improvement, such as the release of a new
version of CIS. Secondly, systems and services for a diverse group of actors were
developed by the judiciary. This placed a huge burden on a few institutions to
meet the scale of needs. Lastly, there was no (or limited) sharing across courts
and other justice delivery institutions such as police, prisons, legal aid
authorities, resulting in multiple citizen touchpoints or interfaces with the
system.

Given the large, diverse, and constantly evolving needs of different users, it is
critical to adopt an approach that supports scale, speed, and sustainability. For
example, the COVID 19 pandemic has revealed the need to evolve services quickly
and at scale for all users. This can be achieved by taking an ‘ecosystem’ approach,
i.e.:

● Design the technology and processes for the ease and access of multiple
ecosystem actors simultaneously: litigants, lawyers, registry or civil
society.

● Enable and support participation from different ecosystem actors for

creation and adoption of services.

● Adopt an architecture that is evolutionary and configurable by design

which requires limited digital infrastructure (in contrast to monolithic).

● Design a system that enables different parts of the justice delivery system
(legal aid authorities, prisons, police etc.) to collaborate and provide
seamless delivery of justice to citizens by reducing touchpoints.

22 - LEARNINGS AND THE OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION

 PHASE I PHASE II PHASE III
AUTOMATION BUILDING ‘SYSTEMS’ BUILDING ‘ECOSYSTEMS’
1. Installing 1. Creation of linkages 1. Open, interopable digital
hardware between judicial systems infrastructure allowing for
infrastructure and other institutions unified, evolutionary
systems
2. Development of 2. Development of
web based solutions monolithic services and 2. Standards and
capabilities for ease of specifications governing
3. Digitisation of
use across users integration of services and
judicial records
capabilities
3. Basic data analytics
3. Infrastructure
capabilities allowing
market players to innovate
and collaborate

4. Analytics led,
evolutionary system
leveraging judicial date

5. Reimagined processes
leveraging new capabilities.

Towards this, Phase III must evolve to enable justice delivery institutions (such
as courts, investigation agencies, and prosecution) to connect, develop and evolve
solutions in a seamless manner. This can significantly improve efficiency by
breaking the silos between the different entities, eliminating duplication of
efforts and realizing economies of scale. For example, if data and records (such
as the FIR) from the police is seamlessly shared with the judiciary, the need for
the judiciary to duplicate the effort of creating a digital copy of such records can
be done away with. Data sharing among different bodies can also lead to
improved analytics, policymaking, and contextual services.

LEARNINGS AND THE OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION- 23

Further, the ecosystem-based approach described above, is an opportunity to
create a multiplier effect for change. Rather than focus on developing all the
solutions itself, the judiciary can curate the right environment and infrastructure
for solutions to emerge rapidly from the ecosystem of public and private actors.
Drawing inspiration from the united payment interface (UPI), there is
opportunity for the judiciary to invest in creating the infrastructure and enabling
ecosystem needed.

India has seen a 383% growth in digital payments during the fiscal year 2018-
19. Digital payments are today commonplace among a wide cross-section of
citizens, including those who never had a bank account.

This would not have happened if the National Payments Corporation of India
had not released its innovation, UPI, which was much ahead of several money
centres all around the world. The UPI platform has given birth to a vibrant
community of both public and private actors in financial services, such as the
mobile wallet Payment Service Providers, who are building solutions in m-
commerce, bill payments, peer to peer real- time payments, etc. Banks
promptly joined hands to provide UPI as a payment mode to merchants and
consumers paved the way for a revolution and played a massive part in
mainstreaming fintech in the country. This ecosystem was made possible by
shared, interoperable digital delivery platforms, anchored by strong
governance frameworks and accountable institution(s).Designing it in a way
that enabled anyone with basic connectivity and a smartphone to access it has
also been the key to ensure inclusion and enable a wide cross-section of society
to leapfrog into making digital payments.

24 - LEARNINGS AND THE OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION

STRENGTHEN FEEDBACK LOOPS

Phases 1 and 2 deployed limited strategies or processes for organised feedback at

the mission, system, or service level. This inhibited the ability to monitor
progress or effectiveness of the implementation of the project or improve design
of the systems or services. For example, lack of clear metrics to monitor
development and implementation of the mission led to a focus on the supply of
solutions and not adoption. Further there is opportunity to include validation,
authentication, or auditing processes for the data entered into the system coupled
with varied periodicity of review mechanisms. This will improve data fidelity on
the system. Similarly, mechanisms can be included for court staff and other users
to share challenges and feedback to improve user design and increase adoption.

Phase III will have to build on these learnings to create strong feedback loops at
the mission, system, and service level. This would include seamless
communication and exchange of ideas between the implementation teams at
states level as well as between District Courts, High Courts and the Supreme
Court. Stakeholder feedback will have to be sought from judges, court staff,
lawyers, and citizens. Such feedback loops must be designed expansively
accounting for access and language barriers and means such as stakeholder
interactions at panchayat levels must complement feedback sought through
digital means.

ENSURE COMPETENCIES AND CREATE CLEAR

ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISMS

The roles and responsibilities in any large-scale digital initiative must be

structured in a way that ensures competencies needed for the mission. While
several iterations were made in the roles and responsibilities between Phases I
and II of the Project to enable decentralised implementation, there remain
several areas for improvement. For example, the time and capacity of many
judges were allocated to advance implementation of the Project, when in fact

LEARNINGS AND THE OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION- 25

their time should be optimised for judicial decision making. Many judges were
burdened with these additional responsibilities over and above their judicial
decision-making roles. The opportunity to also include dedicated experts in
process-reengineering, technology, product design and communication was
missed. Ensuring competencies while creating clear and enabling accountability
frameworks will be critical for Phase III.

Learning from both accomplishments and challenges from the previous phases it
is critical that Phase III takes a transformative approach to making justice more
accessible, inclusive, and efficient for the citizen while enabling an innovation
landscape to allow for diverse solutions.

26 - LEARNINGS AND THE OPPORTUNITY FOR ACTION

 VISION FOR PHASE III

"I will give you a talisman. Whenever you are in doubt, or when the self
becomes too much with you, apply the following test. Recall the face of the
poorest and the weakest man [woman] whom you may have seen, and ask
yourself, if the step you contemplate is going to be of any use to him [her]. Will
he [she] gain anything by it? Will it restore him [her] to a control over his [her]
own life and destiny? In other words, will it lead to swaraj [freedom] for the
hungry and spiritually starving millions?

Then you will find your doubts and yourself melt away."

M.K. GANDHI

Phase III of the e-Courts project in India is rooted in Gandhi’s talisman. The
continuing endeavour of the Indian judiciary in independent India has been to
provide expeditious and inexpensive access to justice for citizens. Today,
technology is a powerful tool to accelerate this endeavour. It offers the
opportunity to make the justice system equitable, facilitating each citizen,
especially the marginalised, to approach it for redress.

At its core, the use of technology in the judiciary is animated by two facets
central to Gandhian thought—access and inclusion. This, when combined
with the other long-standing objectives of the judicial system—equity and
efficiency—provide the founding vision of Phase III of the e-Courts
project, towards digital courts.

VISION FOR PHASE III- 27

To achieve this vision, we need to fundamentally expand the scope of what we
mean by the justice system. In the 21st century, we must see the administration
of justice not just as a sovereign function, but as a service which is provided to
the community by different actors. And in that sense, technology integration
towards better justice delivery in Phase III must encompass the complete
lifecycle of justice:

i. Dispute mitigation - To ensure a better understanding of legal

rights and remedies for the common citizen, to empower them to
decide the best way of resolving issues devoid of adversarial court
litigation.
ii. Dispute containment - Primarily referring to alternative dispute
resolution methods where while trappings of adjudication exist,
the process occurs outside the courts in a more amicable manner.
iii. Dispute resolution- Imbuing traditional justice delivery
institutions—courts, tribunals, police, prisons, legal aid with the
vision outlined above.

This vision for Phase III is built on four building blocks: a set of core values, a
whole-of-system approach, a focus on adoption of technology by users, and a
robust governance framework.

CORE VALUES: Phase III must strive for a modern judicial system, governed
by core values of trust, empathy, sustainability, and transparency which
maximise the positives of technology, and minimise its risks and challenges.
Details of these and principles relating to development of technology and
implementation are listed in “Core Values of Digital Courts”.

WHOLE-OF-SYSTEM APPROACH: Phase III must aim to make processes

more efficient across all three components of dispute management i.e. dispute
avoidance, containment and resolution. Each of these components will require
technological integration with different institutions. For instance, dispute
avoidance can include an online service which can evaluate an (legal) issue faced

28 - VISION FOR PHASE III

by an individual and provide sound and trustworthy pro bono advice on a suitable
course of action. This would require information and communication technology
(ICT) integration to extend to the State and National Legal Service Authorities.
Going forward, a pragmatic approach may lie in the development of a hybrid
model, allowing for both physical and Virtual Courts to co-exist. Such a hybrid
model will supplement and not supplant physical courtrooms.

ADOPTION FRAMEWORKS: It is imperative for Phase III to focus on

building strong adoption frameworks. Such frameworks must include
behavioural nudges, adequate training and skill set development, feedback loops,
along with the requisite mandate of law. It is reiterated that technological
innovation cannot per se yield change; its integration and implementation is
crucial to accomplishing the objectives it is built for.

GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORK: From a governance perspective, while

numerous judicial decisions have validated the use of technology in judicial
processes, Phase III must address the accompanying administrative structures.
Through modification of existing laws, rules, and practices, as well as the
enactment of newer ones, e-Courts, and any future technological endeavours
regarding e-Courts must be founded on a stable governance framework. This will
serve as the foundation of a complex, yet seamless justice system of the future,
ensuring both scale and stability.

The key goals and strategy of Phase III prioritise the creation of a core Digital
Infrastructure that can enable the development of services for dispute resolution
by the judiciary and services of solutions for dispute containment and resolution
by the ecosystem.

As Gandhiji recognised during his years as a lawyer in South Africa, the

profession of the law and the courts ought to be the highest form of public service.
In order to ensure that it is a service that is oriented towards all citizens,
irrespective of wherewithal, ability or assistance to approach the courts, the

VISION FOR PHASE III- 29

justice delivery system must leverage the immense power of e-Courts. This will
ensure that justice is not the privilege of the few, but the entitlement of all.

30 - VISION FOR PHASE III

 CORE VALUES OF DIGITAL
COURTS

“The core values governing digital courts or trust, empathy, sustainability and
transparency.”

TRUST

Digitisation efforts should ensure that constitutional and legal rights accorded to
individuals, of dignity to life, liberty, equality, freedom, and fraternity are
guarded and secured. They should enhance the trust and ability of the legal
system to secure the rights of individuals. This demands that the process of
digitisation is consultative by design, inviting inputs from all. Equally that
digitisation processes advance trust by enabling and leveraging ecosystem
capability to serve justice.

EXAMPLE: Live streaming or sharing recorded court proceedings can

enable courts to become more open. Similarly leveraging technology to enable
transcriptions of court proceedings can enable courts to realise their full
potential to become ‘courts of record’. Adopting open-source software and
algorithmic transparency, sharing open data will enhance trust. In addition,
the process of adoption of Digital Courts, too, by virtue of being a consultative
process, will foster trust by engaging with feedback at every step.

CORE VALUES OF DIGITAL COURTS- 31

EMPATHY

The Constitution requires the State to enhance and ensure equal opportunity,
accessibility, and inclusivity in the entire judicial process. In line with this
mandate, digitisation efforts should be based on empathy for all actors and
especially oriented towards securing access to services, information, and data to
all persons, irrespective of their socio-economic circumstances. It must be
designed to consider the impact of existing and proposed norms on the most
marginalised and vulnerable sections of the population. It must be accessible
online and offline in self-service and assisted modes and have in-built translation
tools and frameworks that allow for multi-lingual access to all services.
Digitisation efforts must be conscious of ‘last mile’ delivery issues, and to solve
ground level exclusion concerns. To ensure empathy in the application of
technology, it is imperative that concerns of inclusion and integration are
addressed at the design stage as well as during adoption, particularly through
harnessing a greater understanding of the experiences of those at the margins of
the digital divide, including users with additional challenges. Such applied
empathy in implementation and adoption of technologies will enable the system
to be intuitive, proactive and responsive to user needs, especially in terms of
filing, access to case information, scheduling, and overall litigation ease and
experience. The use of technology by the judiciary will abide by the principles of
‘fair trial’ and safeguard the right of parties involved.

EXAMPLE: E-filings and hearings through video-conferencing,

especially if made accessible to use on a smartphone, can make the
Supreme Courts more accessible to people from remote corners of the
country who may currently be effectively excluded from accessing the
court because of the costs and other resources involved in procuring
representation before the Supreme Court. Technology can make court
proceedings accessible to litigants with disabilities and vulnerabilities.
Similarly, solutions can be designed to enable the court to proactively
monitor if a person granted bail has actually been released from prison

32 - CORE VALUES OF DIGITAL COURTS

 and take appropriate action, instead of depending on a lawyer to file
necessary applications for reduction of surety amounts or change of bail
conditions. Translation tools leveraging technology to ensure judicial
documents are available in regional languages is another example of
empathy as it seeks to include more people in the judicial process.
Solutioning with an empathetic mindset is critical to the success of Digital
Courts and fostering adoption.

SUSTAINABILITY

Digitisation should enable judicial administrative processes to move towards

becoming more environmentally sustainable by, for example, minimising paper-
based filings, physical movement of documents from one forum to another, and
travel of lawyers, litigants and other actors to reduce the carbon footprint of the
courts. Although Phase II incorporated efforts to introduce solar energy in courts,
these can be expanded significantly. Digitisation of courts should proceed with
respect to continuity of those traditions that are meaningful and effective.
Additionally, it should also target sustainable technology enhancement and
evolution in tune with the community it serves. Given the tremendous monetary
and human resources being invested in the e-Courts project, it is critical that it is
scalable and financially sustainable. An environmental impact assessment will be
undertaken to ensure any new technology/hardware being introduced do not
cause any negative repercussions to the environment.

EXAMPLE: The introduction of ‘paperless courts’ in New Delhi, reworking

document sizes, permitting two-sided printing for submissions, etc., were
conceived of as steps towards becoming more sustainable. Further, e-filings,
remote hearings, and the digitisation of court records can significantly reduce
the environmental burden of the judicial process.

CORE VALUES OF DIGITAL COURTS- 33

TRANSPARENCY

The principle of ‘open courts’ is at the core of the functioning of our judicial
system. Openness includes access to courts and public hearings, reasoned orders,
and to information regarding the functioning of courts. Open justice promotes
transparency, trust, and accountability, both to the public at large, and within the
institution. Adoption of open technology (codes, data, standards, licenses, and
application programming interfaces (APIs)) and opening access to data and
information about the functioning of courts, including administrative processes
will enhance shared visibility around the functioning of courts for all actors. It
will generate data, which could be used to enable evidence-based policy making
about the judicial process. The design of open courts should be subject to a data
governance framework and be sensitive to privacy and security of parties, whilst
preserving the integrity of the judicial process.

EXAMPLE: An evolving and expanding ecosystem requires standards

and certifications that govern and enable solutions to plug into the
platform. Prior publication of open standards creates a level playing field
for market operators to develop solutions. In addition, adopting
algorithmic transparency to make available AI algorithms and design
models from the Judiciary will enable independent and transparently
conducted, periodic technical audits.

34 - CORE VALUES OF DIGITAL COURTS

 BENEFITS FOR STAKEHOLDERS

Through a whole-of-system approach, a focus on adoption of technology by

users, and a robust governance framework, Phase III aspires to create value for
each user. While the full potential of Digital Courts will be unlocked over time,
certain illustrative benefits within the timeline of Phase III are discussed below.

FOR CITIZENS

● Better scheduling mechanisms, online digital filings, and different

mediums of hearings will provide certainty of events, increase access to
courts from anywhere, and advance access to timely justice.

● Digital orders in multiple regional languages will significantly improve

understanding of the process and access to justice.

● E-filings and virtual hearings will reduce legal and travel costs, thereby
reducing the costs of accessing justice.

● Proactive alerts and information, live streaming of cases, and open data
that would constantly evolve and better the system, will increase
transparency and trust in the system.

● Real-time assistance through eSeva Kendras and helpdesks will empower

users to utilise available services.

BENEFITS FOR STAKEHOLDERS- 35

 ● Case information across various courts can be uniform in structure, which
will enable tracking of case status in various courts simpler.

● Conscious design will ensure that courts are made more accessible to
persons with additional challenges.

FOR LAWYERS

● Seamless filings, service of summons / prior notice to the opposite party

and hearings from their cities or homes will bring time and cost
efficiencies to their practice.

● Make available the same records of files as the courts since the digital case
file available with the lawyer / litigant will be identical to the court record
of the case. Further, changes being in real time, will reduce the need for
inspection or regular updation of case files by the lawyer / party. This will
also avoid issues arising from loss of case records or the need to
reconstruct case files.

● Better scheduling will enable better time utilisation.

● Orders from different courts made available in regional languages will

enable smoother transition of cases from court to court.

● Digital hearings and e-filings will enable the practice of law to become
more inclusive for women and differently abled lawyers.

● Greater access to information about similar cases will support crafting

legal arguments and strategies.

● Real-time assistance to facilitate adoption of digitally enabled processes.

36 - BENEFITS FOR STAKEHOLDERS

FOR JUDGES

● There will be greater data, information and support for decision making
about the management of the case flow. Forms and data fields will be
designed to capture information relevant to support this process.

● A unified digital platform will enable courts to track the progress of cases
from the court of original jurisdiction through appellate courts.

● Intelligent scheduling will support prioritisation of cases as well as time

management.

● Greater ease to search, track and index digital documents, will make it
easier to access facts and legal precedents in real-time.

● Greater access to information and research tools.

FOR COURT STAFF

● Automating processes for scrutiny and review of filed documents. Digital

filings will optimise time, minimise errors and increase effectiveness of the
Registry.

● Reduce dependence on the physical registry.

● Smart templates for orders and the design of case management systems
being built on top of machine-readable files can reduce workload of court
staff by minimising need to input data.

● Dedicated real-time assistance will reduce the burden on court staff in

correcting errors and providing guidance on processes.

BENEFITS FOR STAKEHOLDERS- 37

FOR THE JUDICIAL AND LEGAL SYSTEM

● Better data visibility on types and classes of cases that create most
caseloads and how they proceed will enable more targeted intervention
and resource allocation by the judiciary.

● Seamless integration of the judicial system with that of the police, prisons,
prosecution, etc., which will improve the speed of information sharing and
more efficient processes.

● Data generated by the system will help inform better laws, procedures, and
more effective resource allocation.

● Accessible open data will enable researchers, academics, and civil society
to better understand the functioning of the judicial system.

● Minimising paper-based processes will bring a significant reduction to the

environmental costs of the judicial and legal system.

● There will be increased security, and minimal time and costs, of moving
physical documents from one court to another.

38 - BENEFITS FOR STAKEHOLDERS

 TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

To realise the vision of improving efficiency and increasing access to justice, it

is vital that Phase III of the e-Courts Project advances India towards Digital
Courts by simplifying processes and fortifying the foundations of the judicial
administration system on a digital platform.

The guiding premise of Digital Courts is that a foundational digital Platform,

combined with simplified procedures, can enhance access, amplify the existing
capacity and improve the efficiency of the overall judicial administration
system.

It is imperative that the processes of digitisation of all court files and extension
of uninterrupted and high-speed internet connectivity to all courtrooms across
the country be completed as a priority. Further, to be truly effective and
transformative, it is critical that Digital Courts go well beyond digitising existing
processes. Given that most judicial processes and procedures evolved in the pre-
digital age, it is critical to examine whether such processes continue to remain
relevant in a digital age or can be simplified and transformed to better serve
justice. Existing processes must be reevaluated for conformity with the vision and
underlying values of trust, empathy, sustainability, and transparency. It is critical
to explore which processes can be made more efficient using technology or be
fundamentally redesigned to enable courts to deliver services not previously
conceivable.

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS- 39

Further, for the reasons mentioned in the section “Learnings and Opportunity for
Action” evolving the e-Courts project architecture from a monolithic, centralised
system to a ‘platform’ is central to:

● support configuration of services to diverse and evolving needs of users

(courts, lawyers, citizens and other government systems) without needing
to be uniform or standardised.

● create the infrastructure that can enable many solutions or services to

constantly evolve collaboratively from the ecosystem.

● enable other pillars of the justice system (namely prisons, police and legal
aid authorities) to interface with the judicial system — through open
standards, specifications and APIs.

● enable participation and wider adoption of the digital infrastructure,

services, and solutions by all segments of society.

● make data such as pleadings, arguments, and judgments from the judicial
system publicly accessible, subject to privacy regulations. Basis a uniform
set of rules, such information and data can be used such that it benefits
the data principal, i.e., litigants, data controller, i.e. Registry, and
potential data users, i.e. academics, researchers, technologists, and
professionals who can leverage machine learning and AI to build solutions
on this data.

Evolving into a platform architecture in Phase III would leverage and adapt
systems already put in place in Phases I and II, as far as they align with platform
goals.

40 - TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

 I. PROCESS RE-ENGINEERING

Technology can be used to improve, streamline, and optimise traditional court

processes. Several repetitive and routine processes designed in a pre-digital era
can take advantage of digital technology to improve efficiency. This approach
emphasises elimination of redundant steps in pursuit of better performance on
predetermined measures of performance. Part of this involves removing digital
replication of traditional paper-based tasks, reducing costs, time and effort for
users. Some examples include:

● Granting legal recognition to digital copies of all documents that are part
of a case file, with the ability to authenticate them quickly and easily.
Where possible, similar recognition should be granted to digital records
held by government departments, to streamline the process of providing
courts with documents, and to track execution of decrees.

● Removing the need to file the entire copy of the main petition and
supporting documents along with appeals or applications to higher
benches by enabling citizens to refer to the case number of the main
matter.

● Eliminating repetitive work for court staff to enter data in the manual
registers, in addition to the digital platform.

● Audio and video recording of evidence and presenting arguments through

audio-visual media which would also be a record of proceedings.

● Scheduling pre-hearing conferences to fix the time schedule in advance for

carrying out the hearing.

● Necessitating that a case be scheduled before a judge in the usual course

only after submission of complete pleadings by all parties.

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS- 41

 ● Integrating payment of process fee with the court fee, at the time of filing
and enabling service of notice through digital means to reduce time taken.

Beyond automation, technology can also play a more transformative role by

enabling users to perform tasks or deliver certain services that would not have
been previously possible. Automated teller machines (ATMs) in the banking
system are a good reference point of such simple yet transformative technology.
In the judicial system, such transformative technology can target processes that
do not need application of judicial mind as has already been done with Virtual
Courts for disposal of traffic challans in Phase II. This can be extended to such
cases under the Motor Vehicle Act, 1988 and Employee Compensation Act, 1923
in which the disputes primarily relate to the calculations for compensation based
on norms conclusively settled by statute or case-law. In such cases, technology
can help empower lawyers and litigants to determine fair compensation and help
avoid or contain disputes. Transformative technology can also enable intelligent
scheduling of cases in such a manner as to reduce the cognitive burden on judges.

It will be essential to adopt a data governance and security policy, modify relevant
existing laws, rules and guidelines to effectuate the application of such automated
or transformative technologies.

II. THE DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE

A digital infrastructure will serve as the backbone that advances the vision of the
e-Courts Project. This constitutes an underlying technological framework
housing components (such as knowledge, processes, platforms, connections, and
data) to develop and operate services utilised by a user. Its technology
architecture must be designed to meet the diverse and evolving needs of
stakeholders, while still remaining unified (and not uniform). For example, for
judges to optimise judicial time through intelligent scheduling technology, for
lawyers to seamlessly file cases online, or for the judicial system to be integrated
with other systems such as that of the police, prisons, etc.

42 - TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

Further, in contrast to closed ‘monolithic systems’, it is critical that the digital
infrastructure enables different parts of the justice delivery system (prisons, legal
aid authorities, police, private players etc) to connect and collaborate for
improving access to justice. The benefits of such an architecture, key elements to
its adoption and principles guiding its design are discussed below.

A. BENEFITS OF ADOPTING A PLATFORM

APPROACH TO ECOSYSTEM DESIGN

1. CREATES A MULTIPLIER EFFECT BY BUILDING A SHARED

DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE

The digital infrastructure and capabilities can facilitate the creation of an infinite
number of additional services / solutions. Such infrastructure must focus on
creation of capabilities (with no user interface such as apps or websites) that act
as the technology backbone needed to create services needed for the user.

For example, digital platforms and capabilities such as a digital case registry, can
not only help evolve services such as e-filing and service of notice, but also allow
the generation of data to create new parameters for judicial performance
evaluation and support intelligent law-making to avoid or contain disputes. The
capability of ‘intelligent scheduling’, can help evolve services such as a queue
management system for lawyers or support judges managing legal aid services
through digital allotment of cases. Another example of an essential component of
digital infrastructure is a reliable means of verifying identities of participants of
court cases, such as lawyers, litigants, and witnesses. Basic capabilities such as
well-defined access controls, natively machine-readable documents of laws and
cases, automated process checks and stage-wise filtration (e.g., admission by
registrars), text-to-voice, voice-to-text, and digitally assisted language
translation must form the basis for redesigning some of the most effort and time-
intensive administrative processes.

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS- 43

Focusing on building the digital infrastructure, will strengthen each platform's
ability to support the constant evolution of existing services and creation of
additional services, such as updated repositories of law or creating self-
assessment tools for judges. It will also avoid repeated investment in migration
between updated systems over time.

2. ENABLES CO-CREATION OF DIVERSE AND SUSTAINABLE

SOLUTIONS

Given the diversity and evolving needs of users of the judicial system, it is critical
to embrace a design that enables a high level of decentralised improvements,
configuration and extensions by different courts and other users.

This can be achieved by adopting ‘microservices architecture’ that designs

technology in a modular way, creating several pieces that are interchangeable and
replaceable without necessitating a redesign of the infrastructure as a whole.

Think of microservices / modular architecture as a house. It is built using

bricks, steel, windows, doors and a host of other inputs independently created
that can be assembled together as per our unique requirements. In case a
windowpane shatters, it is replaceable without having to take down the entire
house to its constituent elements. This is the essence of modularity.

This allows for the design of services initiated by the courts to evolve, and scale
based on both feedback from users and with change in technology, such as
improved encryption and ID verification. Irrespective of which element of the
service (an e-filing portal, a transcription service) or micro-service (payment,
signing) is required to be changed based on the needs of users, it can be done
easily without having to change or re-design the entire system. Such a continuous
process of iteration and co-creation will help inform and design new
infrastructure capabilities and services. Thus, enabling each court and other

44 - TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

users to configure the services and capabilities to its context easily, without
disrupting other parts of the system, and without making the system more
complex. A visual of the platform design is depicted below in Figure

Enabling interactions and exchange of data between capabilities, and services is

critical to enable co-creation of services by different ecosystem actors and also
improve the efficiency and intelligence of the system by allowing elements to
‘talk’ to each other. This can be achieved through the creation of interfaces or
APIs that can help different services connect seamlessly, much like the grooves
in Lego blocks.

Such APIs can empower citizens, lawyers and law firms, other organisations
within the justice system such as police and prisons, companies, government
departments (as litigants), and many other stakeholders, to access and use data
and capability to develop new services, tools and solutions relevant to their
context. For example, it can enable Tribunals to build on such capabilities to
evolve solutions relevant to their context, which can further feed intelligence into
the platforms. Subject to certification (see below), law offices or the private sector
can evolve tools for discovery, tracking filings and managing documents. Law

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS- 45

offices may build a filing interface over the e-filing infrastructure that enables
automated pre-screening for defects or consistency in documentation.

3. AMPLIFIES IMPACT THROUGH ECOSYSTEM PARTICIPATION FOR

IMPLEMENTATION AND ADOPTION

To achieve impact and implement at scale, it is central to leverage the collective

strength of the ecosystem: civil society, public and private sector. Each of their
diverse and complementary strengths such as deep understanding of context,
access to infrastructure, resources, and talent.

It can allow the ecosystem players to extend and leverage the infrastructure to
continuously develop new technological capabilities for their own needs or that
of courts and the associated administration. For example, it could lead to the
development of applications by the private sector that can integrate listing of
cases with billing services for lawyers / proactive alerts for litigants. Similarly
orders and judgements can be integrated with better research tools for judges and
lawyers. Pending case information can be integrated with case management
systems for large companies or government departments, thereby increasing the
adoption of the infrastructure. It can also enable civil society organizations to
integrate services, such as e-filing, ODR with their programs on the ground.

KEY ELEMENTS OF DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE

The Goal:
To meet the diverse and evolving needs of different users of judicial system,
while remaining unified

IMPLEMENTATION AND ADOPTION CSC’S

PARTNERSHIPS WITH AWARENESS
COMPLIANT RESTRAINT
TRAININGS

SERVICES AND SOLUTIONS DIGITAL HEARINGS

E-FILINGS

46 - TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

 NSTEP
TRANSCRIPTION
ONLINE PAYMENTS

ENABLING CASE INFRASTRUCTURE DIGITAL CASE REGISTRY

JUDGE AND LAWYER
REGISTRY
PROTOCOLS AND STANDARDS
MACHINE READABLE DOCUMENTS
SUVAS
INTELLIGENT SCHEDULING

B. STANDARDS, SPECIFICATIONS AND

CERTIFICATIONS

It is critical to promote trust and collaboration in such an ecosystem by providing

standards, specifications and certifications that can act as guardrails as different
actors build solutions across space and time.

STANDARDS OF DATA, processes and technology can enable effective

coordination through a common vocabulary and experience across various areas.
To illustrate, today, different states have different methods to classify what a
‘case’ is. Some states classify an interim application as a distinct case from the
main case while others classify it as a part of the main case. Developing a uniform
standard (as opposed to standardisation) for the classification of a ‘case’ and case
types will not only increase transparency of data but will also enhance
interoperability of data across courts and with other entities such as police,
prisons etc, subject to relevant legal processes and access controls. Standards can
also be developed for processes (such as filing) and technology (hardware or
software) that can enable efficiency. Such standards can also allow interaction of
data between different services such as e-filing and intelligent case scheduling to

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS- 47

enable how each of these services evolve over time to become more intelligent
and efficient.

SPECIFICATIONS OF DATA and technology ensure uniformity and quality

of technology. For example, open API specifications can help in ensuring
seamless communication between diverse systems (e.g., services). Taxonomy
specifications can provide the metadata for the classification systems to enable
meaningful data exchange.

CERTIFICATIONS on the capability of actors who can use or engage the

platforms act as an effective mechanism to create trust in the ecosystem. For
example, the Digital Infrastructure can develop authenticated processes to
enable different actors to use a platform: judges, lawyers, mediators, registry or
litigants. Certifications can also create the governance processes and
accountability to facilitate the collaboration between the appropriate actors,
including High Courts, regulators, other justice delivery authorities and private
sector companies, to build and deliver solutions.

Open and published standards and specifications enable increased

interoperability between solutions and systems and reduces the barriers to
participation by ecosystem actors. For this to happen, standards and
specifications must be adopted through a collaborative process in which
stakeholders can participate and must be within the purview of applicable data
governance and privacy laws. Documentation of standards and specifications
should be made open and accessible.

The digital infrastructure will be ever-evolving, scalable, agile and sustainable. It

will not only enable better delivery of services but also improve the efficiency and
intelligence of the system. For instance, at the base level, the data from the system
would streamline courts’ caseloads through better court management and
intelligent scheduling and create new parameters for judicial performance and
accountability. Better data systems can also provide the necessary analytics to
support intelligent lawmaking towards reducing disputes.

48 - TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

 C. PRINCIPLES FOR DEVELOPMENT OF A
DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE AND PLATFORMS

Building on the “Core Values of Digital Courts” laid out the development of the
digital infrastructure should adhere to the following guiding principles to ensure
it can evolve over time, as the needs of its users change:

1. PRIVACY AND SECURITY BY DESIGN

Ensuring security and privacy of data will be a critical part of building the digital
infrastructure and maintaining trust between ecosystem stakeholders. Designing
with the principles of capturing minimal personal identifiable or other sensitive
data, keeping the transient data in memory only, storing data in anonymised
ways and displaying only relevant attributes on the user interface is key to
ensuring privacy and security. The judiciary needs precise, codified regulations
which specify categories of information, the restrictions and access permissions
associated with them, and how these relate to specific actors such as judges, the
registry, lawyers, and litigants. It would need to designate categories of data,
based on several relevant factors. One of these would be the kind and magnitude
of harm that the person it pertains to would be exposed to if the data was made
public. Tier-based access to data must be specified, based on the role of a person,
for example, whether they are a judge, lawyer, litigant, investigating officer, or
witness. People identifiable in judicial data must have data rights, and obligations
must be imposed on any users of judicial data, including the judiciary and
external users. These rights and obligations must be codified and made
enforceable. For cases in which the regulation is ambiguous, the regulation must
prescribe tests of both the level of vulnerability resulting from making certain
data public, as well as of the transparency demanded to ensure public
accountability, so that these may be weighed against one another. It would also
need to specify case types and legislations for which privacy regulations may be
more stringent, such as cases under the Protection of Children from Sexual
Offences Act or matrimonial cases. Assessments of vulnerability must take into
account the quantity and detail in which data is made available, which we will

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS- 49

discuss below in the context of open data. Finally, these tests should be designed
to ensure that the process is as consistent and objective as possible. To bring these
aspects to fruition, the e-Committee has already formed a Privacy and Data
Security sub-committee to formulate a data governance framework for the
judiciary.

2. OPEN AND INTEROPERABLE

Openness should be core to all processes and outcomes. This serves two key
purposes – promoting transparency and ensuring interoperability between the
judicial platform and other systems. Designing for openness from an
interoperability perspective includes building and promoting open-source code
as the e-Courts mission is already doing. FOSS software can be relied on not only
in the interest of cost and development time, but also because it allows
configurability and adaptability and allows collaborative development. Along
with this, it should also include open data, designs, standards, licenses, research,
infrastructure, APIs and more. The design should also promote interoperability
to help realise inter-platform efficiencies. Such interoperability should uphold
the principle of independence of the judiciary and adhere to the data governance
framework that is being formulated. Further, adopting algorithmic transparency
to make available AI algorithms and design models will enable independent and
transparently conducted, periodic technical audits.

Further, adopting open standards with an API driven architecture allows ease of
integration with existing systems such as UPI and integration of latest
technologies with the platform in future. Open APIs will enable a wide range of
Digital Courts application providers to build on the digital infrastructure
developed by ecosystem players, by making use of the existing capabilities and
services available. For example, data collection tools for universities and
researchers to undertake studies on a range of issues including pendency,
research tools for judges and lawyers, and case management solutions for
institutions with large numbers of disputes. Open APIs can also allow the

50 - TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

ecosystem players to access open data and produce relevant data services for the
judicial and legal community, including towards dispute avoidance and
containment.

It must also be recognised that there is a close relationship between regulations

intended to preserve privacy and data security and those intended to promote
openness and transparency. Regulations for data disclosure and a unified data
policy must balance both. In addition to categories of information based on
vulnerability and permissions described above, regulations should specify a
hierarchy of categories of case type and legislation, based on the need for
transparency in those cases.

3. ACCESSIBLE AND INCLUSIVE

The design should enable people’s rights to access the judicial process
irrespective of their socio-economic background. Ease of access can be secured
by incorporating user-friendly user interface and user experience (UI / UX)
design, ensuring compatibility with standards designed for those with challenges,
minimising friction and reducing the cost of interaction so that nobody is
excluded. In addition, ensuring optimal service delivery through omni-channel
(e.g., web, mobile), universal, and affordable access is essential. For example,
ensure availability of content on a platform in all official languages (not only
Hindi and English), create multiple formats of access to the services offered by
the platform, such as interactive voice response system (IVRS) services for users
without smartphones or internet. A greater understanding of the user
experiences of those at the margins must be sought to inform design on a
continuous basis.

4. REUSABLE AND EXTENSIBLE

Incorporating modular architecture will promote repurposing and extending of

elements in diverse contexts. It helps in saving valuable time that would

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS- 51

otherwise be wasted in reinventing the wheel for every separate build. It also
promotes innovation by extending open architectures to new ecosystems.

5. AGILE, DATA-DRIVEN DEVELOPMENT METHOD

Instead of spending upfront time to build a solution incorporating all value-

added features, parts of which may be obsolete or irrelevant by roll-out, a
platform should be built incrementally. This can be done by developing the most
minimum viable products to which additional features can be added as
understanding of user behaviour improves and / or new use cases emerge. Such
an iterative and incremental approach enables and encourages rapid and flexible
response to change, of all kinds. FOSS software has an advantage in that
commonly understood software can rapidly be adapted and modified.

Generating data by design and regularly reviewing data about the performance
of the system will enable the ongoing user centric evolution of the platform.
Leveraging analytics to identify new features and capabilities can also improve
its user-centricity and effectiveness. Where appropriate, independent research
partners can help with research on pilot projects, particularly with regard to
supplying technical expertise and developing and evaluating performance
metrics.

6. USER-CENTRIC DESIGN

Rather than relying heavily on changing the behaviour of potential users, be it

lawyers, judges, court managers or litigants, their diverse needs should be
incorporated into the design of the platforms, including for example, the enabling
blended offerings of online and offline services, while leveraging eSeva Kendras
and help desks to provide real time assistance. This should be accompanied by
the institution of an effective training programme for potential users and setting
up mechanisms for technical support and grievance redressal, such as through
appointment of dedicated support staff that can serve as point-of-contact. For

52 - TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

ease of access and in the interest of transparency, appropriate Court related
information to be made publicly available online along with facilities to file RTIs
online.

7. SCALABLE

Digital Courts should be designed for the future and should keep pace with new
expectations and technological breakthroughs, as they evolve over the years.
Hence, it should have an architecture that can easily accommodate new systems
and capabilities, as required. The digital infrastructure should have the ability to
serve any unexpected surge in demand and unplanned expansion at scale. It
should also be designed for scale to ensure that it can be deployed nationwide.

8. SYSTEM WIDE PERSPECTIVE

The digital infrastructure should focus on removing silos and enabling the
delivery of services, record keeping and sharing of data towards integrating
courts, tribunals, prisons, legal aid authorities, forensic service agencies and the
police.

9. RESILIENT

When dealing with complex problems and processes, a platform should have the
ability to deal with the variability of the challenges. Solutions and services should
be replaceable and adaptable to minimise the impact of any changes, and also to
adapt seamlessly to unexpected scenarios.

10. COMMODITISED AND HETEROGENEOUS

The choices to pick the technologies while building a public infrastructure are
different than those while building a private infrastructure as the risks are
different. It is preferable to choose commoditised technologies such as

TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS- 53

technologies provided by several providers (e.g., broadband services) rather than
proprietary technologies for building the digital infrastructure for Digital Courts.
In the long run, commoditised technology products, licenses, algorithms, and
software (e.g., open-source code) make development cheaper and reliable at
scale. Commoditised technologies allow integration across services, unlike a
proprietary technology, where data stored in proprietary format is only
compatible with its own services. The adoption of FOSS software, in particular,
offers the advantage of preventing the judiciary becoming dependent on any
vendor or solution (‘vendor lock-in’). Technologies already developed, both
market products and those developed by the public sector, can be relied on to
save time and resources that would go into in house development. For example,
the cloud-based website development product ‘Secure, Scalable and Sugamya
Website as a Service’ could be utilised.

11. UNIFIED NOT UNIFORM DEVELOPMENT

Broad design and specifications of technologies and processes should be outlined

at the national level. This is key from the point of view of hardware and software
to be used, and services to be rendered, being seamless and unified (allowing for
variations from State to State). However, budgeting, deployment and
implementation need to be decentralised to allow for greater ownership,
flexibility, and adaptation to local contexts. Effectuating the vision described
above including the design and building of a digital platform for the judiciary
requires a suitably empowered institutional structure. Please see the section
titled “Institutional and Governance Framework'' discussing relevant
considerations to choose of institutional structure and a suggested option.

54 - TOWARDS DIGITAL COURTS

 KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

While developing infrastructure and services that may plug into dispute
resolution immediately, ecosystem capabilities for dispute mitigation and
containment must also be strengthened through conscious technology and
institutional design on an ongoing basis.

Based on the values and principles laid out in the previous sections and to
mitigate challenges that may be faced, Phase III must ensure (i) access to the
relevant hardware, (ii) the creation of needed digital infrastructure and (iii)
access to critical services.

1. ENSURE THE INSTALLATION OF RELEVANT HARDWARE

A critical prerequisite for Digital Courts is that all courts have stable, effective
and reliable broadband connectivity, data storage capabilities, timely
maintenance, power supply and the required hardware to be able use and deliver
digital services. Since many courts rely on obsolete hardware which is inadequate
for many of the goals of Phase III, replacement of obsolete hardware is an
important early objective. In identification of requisite hardware, due
consideration must be afforded to critical user centric issues such as accessibility
for persons with additional challenges, and conformance with relevant standards.

Adoption of solar energy in courts would be an important contribution to efforts

to mitigate climate change, especially given the increases in immediate electricity
consumption that accompany digitization. By eliminating or reducing
dependence on paper, digital processes and record keeping can significantly
reduce deforestation, energy consumption involved in transporting physical

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 55

records, energy usage in production of paper, and generation of waste, among
other environmental costs of paper usage. In addition, adoption of solar energy
is beneficial because unreliable supply of electricity has been a recognized
obstacle to the transition to digital judicial services under Phases I and II. The
Government of India approved solar power in 5 % court Complexes under Phase
II of the e-Courts Project, and the scope of this effort should be expanded for
Phase III

II. ADOPT DATA GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORK

It is imperative for Digital Courts that the judiciary adopts a comprehensive data
governance framework for the datasets that it is a controller of. Such a framework
would balance the principle of open courts and data privacy and security. The
judiciary will establish guidelines and standards governing the onus of
safekeeping and terms of use/ processing of data including safeguarding interests
of litigants, encryption of evidence and documents submitted and methods in
which data is utilized and stored by the judiciary. The framework will include
details regarding how different stakeholders may access the judicial data.

The framework will be forward-looking to include the use of artificial intelligence,

address problems of cyber security and interoperability between judicial and
non-judicial platforms. The judiciary has laid the foundation of drafting a privacy
policy for the judiciary by setting up a sub-committee, Privacy and Data Security
Committee, under the aegis of the e-Committee.

III. CREATE THE DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE

Some of the core digital platforms that must be prioritised for Phase III are:

JUDICIAL TRUSTWORTHY DIGITAL REPOSITORIES (JTDRS)

Judicial Trustworthy Digital Repositories (JTDRs). They will function as an

authoritative digital case registry. They will include a collection of case related

56 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

data including the unique case number and case type. A reliable way of ‘locating
a case’ is key to processing data related to a case efficiently and enabling all
interactions that need to happen in relation to a case (whether it is video
conferencing, e-filing, tagging or scheduling). To this end, a unique case locator
is a high leverage point to build the foundational capabilities of Digital Courts.

With the CIS, the e-Courts mission has made significant strides towards
developing a unique CNR and QR codes for each case. Phase III will build on this
to ensure unified standards for identifiers of a case, ensuring CNR is linked in
every case and scaling its adoption across India. It will enable a unified case
registry across courts through the creation of data standards. Given that records
in JTDRs will be maintained in accordance with these standards, APIs can be
implemented to provide data from JTDRs to other information systems or
applications that require a reliable source of judicial records. Examples of these
could include litigation management systems for government departments or
large legal firms or researchers in academia and civil society. CNR and QR codes
should be assigned in a manner that enables all relevant stakeholders to track the
lifecycle of a case from institution to final disposal, including appeals. This will
help litigants and lawyers trace the case history and retrieve information from
earlier instances of cases and will make case flow management easier for the
judiciary.

Such a unique case locator will enable tagging of related matters across
jurisdictions, enhance visibility of the status of a case for all parties involved and
access services related to a case. It will enable the generation of data relating to
every service linked to the case, which in turn can inform better laws, procedures
and more effective resource allocation. Over time the collation and analysis of
reliable and unified data sets may enable the implementation of litigation risk
assessment services.

A COMPREHENSIVE AND UPDATED REPOSITORY OF CASE LAW

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 57

A freely accessible, updated, and comprehensive database of all legal precedents
must form the backbone to a judicial system based on common law. In addition
to the e-Courts website, each High Court has one or more databases of the
decisions and opinions of the courts within its jurisdiction. The repository of case
law across India on the web is therefore fragmented and may sometimes be
restricted to certain courts within a state. A national repository for legal
precedent from all courts will ensure a uniform, reliable and visible database for
all case laws.

Towards this, Phase III will build over the platform of the e-Courts website to
create a freely accessible aggregator of indexed case laws through coordination
with High Courts and the use of appropriate standards and specifications along
with open APIs.

A reliable repository will allow for democratised access to precedents for users,
standardised citations across the judiciary. In addition, open APIs will allow
service providers such as case reporters to construct tools for value addition,
further enabling ease of access, research, reporting and analysis.

MAKE DOCUMENTS MACHINE READABLE AND SECURE

Having all documents entering and exiting the system in machine-readable

formats will create the capability to continuously gain and share data at scale.
This will advance the effectiveness and transparency of Digital Courts. Building
capabilities that ensure the security and integrity of documents will also generate
trust and effectiveness of Digital Courts.

Towards this, Phase III of the project will prioritise adoption of different
technologies that increase the machine readability of typed, handwritten,
scanned or printed documents including optical character reader (OCR), smart
forms etc. Such digital documents should be supported with authentication
systems like digital signatures. It should also be supported by necessary processes
and technology such as blockchain to secure the court records from tampering

58 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

and ensure their integrity. Data generated from such capability can help evolve
services to enable litigants track trends and patterns to determine the cost and
time of pursuing a case. The data can also help identify cases which use fairly
formulaic pleadings such as mutual consent divorce pleas, to develop templates
in the future to simplify processes for litigants. A step beyond formulaic pleadings
is dematerialising certain applications and processes whereby the need to
populate even formulaic fields is done away with. Applications such as a request
for adjournment on medical grounds within defined limitations may be
dematerialised i.e., made accessible through one-click buttons.

Machine readable documents will support effective digitisation of data and will
significantly contribute to reducing the workload of the registry to input data.
Further, data derived from such capability can enable the identification of
patterns in cases to take steps to avoid and contain disputes (both within the
court and outside). SOPs would need to be developed and implemented for both
the digitisation process and the E-Filing process to ensure that a consistent level
of accuracy and quality of records is maintained.

INTELLIGENT SCHEDULING

Co-ordinating the availability and schedules of different users: judges, lawyers

and litigants is a critical part of the court administrative process. Leveraging
technology to create an infrastructure that can optimise and coordinate their
time, can unlock significant capacities for justice administration and overall
bring greater efficiencies to the system. Over time, this will also increase
reliability in the system by enabling all actors to manage their time better.

Such a scheduling system must intelligently recommend (and not decide)

appropriate schedules by using AI. Such tools can factor in variables such as the
schedules of judges, lawyers (including the requirement of their presence in other
courts), witnesses, registrars, existing caseload, the type of case, nature of
hearings, data from earlier cases to evolve and become more intelligent over time.
Such intelligent scheduling can generate data to identify cases that need to be

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 59

prioritised and generate data and act as a capability to support digital listing and
other services. Over time, this infrastructure can enable services such as an
‘intelligent queue management system’ for lawyers to get a better estimate of the
time when their hearing may come up.

This capability can reduce the number of adjournments, increase the capacity of
judges and lawyers, and overall bring greater efficiencies to the system.

INTEROPERABLE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM (ICJS)

Courts, police, and prisons currently have independent systems including

technology enabled e-Courts, The Crime and Criminal Tracking Networks and
Systems (CCTNS), and e-prisons, respectively. These function in silos and are not
interoperable for the most part. There is a need for seamless exchange of live
data, subject to restrictions and rules under the applicable data governance
framework, between these and other arms of the criminal justice system such as
legal aid, forensic labs and prosecutors, to accelerate processes, prevent
procedural lapses and ensure judicial orders are executed efficiently.

While the ICJS project has identified and commenced the sharing of certain kinds
of data and metadata between systems (such as PDF versions of first information
reports (FIR) and case diaries), it will be critical to develop data standards,
specifications, protocols and certifications needed to operationalise and scale
ICJS Processes will also have to be examined and reengineered to accelerate the
services. For example, virtual submission of FIRs and chargesheets (entered
through smart forms) to judges will save time and enable easier analysis and will
avoid unnecessary filing of applications before courts. However, along with the
focus on increased efficiency, there should be sufficient checks and balances to
ensure that the independence of the judiciary is always maintained and that such
systems are not misused against any stakeholder.

Allowing elements of the criminal justice system to “talk” to each other, will allow
for seamless tracking and prioritisation of processes. This will also eliminate

60 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

duplication of data across platforms and will eliminate delays in the transmission
of documents across agencies and across states. For example, it can enable the
immediate transmission of the release order from the courts to the parsons for
the release of the bail applicant. Further, in the event the applicant is not able to
fulfil the bail conditions within a fixed time period, the magistrate granting bail
should be automatically notified so that the bail conditions may be reexamined.

IV. SERVICES

Building on the infrastructure described above, services will have to be designed

after factoring processes that can be re-engineered, accompanied with necessary
amendments to applicable laws. Drawing from such process-reengineering some
of the services that must be prioritised for Phase III are:

DIGITAL CASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

The reliance on the need to physically move case files (orders and filings) from
one court to another consumes significant time and environmental costs for all
actors. The secure access to digital case files (orders and filings) from anywhere
will significantly advance access and efficiency of Digital Courts for all actors.

To achieve this, Phase III will build a case management system that can be
securely accessed by lawyers, clients, registry and judges. Such a system will
leverage the capability to make documents machine readable, to enable case
documents available in multiple languages. It should allow for seamless access
and exchange of documents among authorised users and the development of
applications and interfaces to use this data. Digital case files should be supported
with processes for authentication and ensuring integrity of the documents.
Features such as bar codes that would help authenticate and track material
objects submitted to courts, can be explored. Time stamps for the uploading of
documents, depositions, and orders should be provided to all authorised users.

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 61

A digital case management system will enable greater ease to search, track and
index documents. This will not only reduce the time taken during a hearing but
also make facts and legal precedents easier for lawyers and judges to access in
real time. Judges in particular can benefit greatly from being able to access tools
and services remotely, by logging into a profile that enables them access to case
databases, software for typing and dictation (once speech recognition is
sufficiently advanced, particularly in Indian languages), tools for performance
monitoring and case management, and templates for writing orders and
judgments.

E-FILING

The ability to file pleadings and pay fees 24 x 7 from anywhere will significantly
enhance ease of access to courts. This along with automating processes for
scrutiny and review of pleadings can optimise time, minimise errors and the
effectiveness of the registry. This will be in tandem with smart templates for filing
documents such as petitions and pleadings and will also include features such as
prompters for seeking consent from litigants/advocates who are entering the
data for publication of personal information. Such capabilities will be leveraged
to ensure that the litigants/lawyers have the option to withdraw consent at any
stage of the case cycle.

Phase III of the e-Courts project will evolve the e-filing system developed in Phase
II to make it more inclusive, seamless, and effective. It will achieve this by
extending interactions between lawyers, litigants and mediators/ arbitrators and
enable making subsequent filings to cases online. It must eliminate physical
duplications of e-filings, enable integrated online payments while allowing those
without the means to make digital payments to do so at a physical counter in the
court premises. Further, e-filing services must also be extended to filing of private
complaints before magistrates. The system should explore putting in place smart
streamlined forms, especially for appropriate cases where standard pleadings are
employed such as negotiable instruments and transfer of property. Such forms
will help remove redundancies, minimise errors, simplify processes for lawyers

62 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

and clients and reduce workload for the registry. It can be made accessible by
making the E-Filing process adaptable to different kinds of devices and secure
enough to be used from locations ranging from cyber cafes to kiosks.

Such digital filings will enable secure access to filings across different
jurisdictions without the need to move the documents. Through the employment
of standards and specifications across jurisdictions and modes of formal dispute
resolution, e-filing portals will serve to eliminate duplication in effort for access
to Lok Adalats and mediation centers. In addition, the automated generation of
receipts will engender transparency, facilitate ease-of-use by providing stepwise
instructions, reduce clerical errors such as in the computation of court fees and
significantly lower costs of preparation of multiple duplicates of filings.

COURTROOM LIVE AUDIO-VISUAL STREAMING SYSTEM (CLASS)

Enabling seamless and inclusive digital hearings will be key to minimise travel
costs of litigants and lawyers, thereby increasing access to justice and reducing
environmental costs. Different forms of digitally enabled hearings must be
explored for diverse use cases. Certain proceedings may require to continue with
in person hearings, while others may explore possibilities of asynchronous
hearings, purely digital hearings, audio-only linkages where necessitated or even
virtual courts. Exploration and adoption of appropriate media would be key for
timely delivery of justice.

Phase III, will focus on enabling courts to deploy quality digitally enabled
hearings, based on nature and type of case. This will have to be supported by
efforts by the High Courts to identify classes/ types of cases where in-person
hearings should be retained, and where various forms of digital hearings can be
adopted. Sound analysis of stakeholder interest is vital before initiating such
deployment particularly in matters of criminal justice where additional
safeguards may be necessary for the rollout of digital hearings. Further High
Courts must re-engineer processes and specify time limits where possible. Such
process re-engineering assumes importance in relation to tasks such as marking

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 63

of documents in suits and computation of damages payable in workmen
compensation disputes which may be accomplished without application of
judicial mind therefore eliminating the need for a traditional hearing.

Digital hearings should also be supported by efforts to make the hearing public,
and the process transparent. This can be achieved either through live streaming
of hearings or where that is not possible, by making records of the proceedings
freely accessible to ensure courts retain the ‘open courts’ principle. Digital
hearings have been adopted by certain states to conduct Lok Adalats. This can
promote transparency and optimise time of lawyers, litigants and judges, whilst
shortening the timelines for deciding cases and increasing access to hearings for
differently abled persons. For easier management, scheduling, archiving, and
other tasks related to open digital hearings under the CLASS system can be
integrated with CIS/case management software.

TRANSCRIPTIONS

Transcriptions of court proceedings are key to building trust and transparency in

the system.

Phase III will prioritise providing lawyers and litigants with technologically
enabled transcriptions of court proceedings from audio or spoken format into a
typed digital format immediately with the order.

Digital transcriptions will provide a precise record of what was said in court. This
will help lawyers and litigants plan their trial plans or appeals, understand the
decision, use the transcription as evidence or share with litigants who were not
present. It will also enable lawyers and litigants to quickly store, search for, and
locate the information they need and increase access to court proceedings for
differently abled persons. In addition, transcriptions may serve as a reference
point for judicial officers, particularly in relation to suggestions of out-of-court
settlements by parties seeking adjournments.

64 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

SERVICE OF NOTICE

Significant time of the court, lawyers and litigants is lost due to delay in service
of notice. Reengineering processes of service of notice and adopting digital
technologies can positively impact simplification of and speed of delivery of
service on other parties to the litigation.

Phase III of the Project will leverage and build upon the Phase II E-filing module
and NSTEP application to enable service process by automatically enabling
service on parties via email / SMS, where possible, with built in systems for
confirmation of receipt. To enable requisite action by the petitioner, it will enable
the proactive disclosure of the status of service of notice to the petitioner prior to
the scheduled date of hearing. Subject to requirements of law, it will also
integrate the payment of process fee along with court fees to minimise delay. It
can also provide alerts to necessary actors by leveraging applicable court rules to
ensure compliance with specified timelines.

Such a service can significantly save time of litigants and lawyers, eliminate the
need for manual processing by registry officials and eliminate disagreements of
receipt of the documents and enhance speed of delivery of justice.

E-SEWA KENDRA

E-Sewa Kendras are centres in court premises that provide information on cases,
as well as digital services. These include providing soft copies of orders and
judgments, answering enquiries on case status, providing services such as e-
filing, online purchase of e-stamp papers, online disposal of traffic challans, and
online payments. Many of their functions overlap with help desks in that they
also provide guidance to litigants in availing legal aid, configuring, and using
digital services from digital services to video conferencing applications for
hearings. They have been created in 19 High Courts and in 219 district courts. For
the expanded scope of digital services envisioned under Phase III, E-Sewa
Kendras could be developed as the main point of contact for litigants at courts

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 65

themselves, where all litigant-facing and lawyer-facing administrative tasks and
services can be performed digitally.

HELP DESK FOR DIGITAL ASSISTANCE - IN-COURT AND REMOTE

There exists a significant digital divide across Indian society. As Phase III adopts
and leverages technological capabilities, it is imperative that this divide be
bridged rather than exaggerated to improve access to justice.

Services such as remote digital assistance for litigants who are unfamiliar with
computers and mobile devices, or who are unable to access digital services. They
would also increase access for litigants who cannot travel physically to the court
premises, can play a critical role in achieving this. Initially such assistance may
be a help desk for litigants to call and find out information regarding listing of
their case or applying for a copy of an order/judgment to be sent by post, etc.
They can also be provided assistance via web chat or a voice response system.
Over time, remote digital assistance can also be expanded to providing litigants
copies of orders/judgments in vernacular languages through post. Assistance can
be provided at court premises themselves for services such as configuring and
explaining software for video hearings, as well as for procedures such as e-filing.
Special assistance can be provided at courts for digitally excluded individuals for
whom remote assistance is inadequate.

Phase III presents an opportunity to leverage technology to reduce the

dependence of litigants on lawyers as a gateway into the legal system. Through
self help facilities and remote assistance, litigants shall be empowered whilst
helping reduce financial and time investments into seeking judicial information.

ADMINISTRATION OF LEGAL AID

The provision of free legal aid is a constitutional mandate to ensure access to

justice. While resources are allocated to this end by legal services authorities, a

66 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

lingering issue has been transparency in case management and provision of
services by empanelled advocates.

Phase III with an accurate case management system, open hearings, ICJS and
digital transcription of proceedings can greatly assist the judges in-charge of legal
aid authorities in more equitable and efficient allotment of cases to legal aid
lawyers aided by data analysis. By appropriately adjusting for stage and pendency
of cases already assigned to lawyers, such service will allow for an equitable
distribution of the caseload amongst empanelled lawyers. Further, since legal aid
cases to be monitored may be filtered electronically (by pendency, adjournments
requested, non-appearance, etc), the judge in charge can ensure greater
accountability by monitoring and tracking cases where their attention is required.

A dedicated service tracking disputes involving legal aid advocates will allow for
judicial officers to effectively discharge their roles as administrators. It will also
create an effective feedback loop where litigants assigned legal aid advocates may
not only track the progress of their case but also bring forth grievances with case
management.

VIRTUAL COURTS

As part of the judicial process re-engineering, Phase III will proactively explore
the application of technology for processes and proceedings that take up judicial
time but where only certain stages necessitate application of judicial mind.

Such proceedings such as compounding of offences by payment of challans (such

as in traffic rule violations), probate proceedings where no objectors enter
appearance, small cause money claims and mutual consent divorce pleas
(building in the possibility of mediation) are an opportunity to automate several
processes and shift them online, while introducing asynchronous judicial
involvement and reduce burden on courts.

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 67

By entertaining pleas where no adversarial process is required, asynchronous
courts will allow for optimal use of judicial time as well as extend convenience of
online process to litigants in appropriate cases.

Provision of digital tools in both virtual and physical courts should be as similar
as possible to each other. This way, lawyers, judges, litigants, and other
participants in proceedings can switch between them easily. Files, records, and
transcripts used in one hearing should be accessible in all subsequent hearings,
irrespective of whether they are held virtually or in person.

WHAT WOULD A COURT USER’S EXPERIENCE OF A DIGITAL

COURT LOOK LIKE?

The proposed setup of digital courts, and the digital infrastructure that will
enable them, are both technical concepts that may be a little difficult to imagine.
This section will illustrate the benefits that they can deliver to citizens, judges,
lawyers, registry staff, and non-judicial court staff so that the document is easier
to relate to. It depicts how a digital court would function, what the experience of
a litigant could potentially look like, and what tools can be made available to
stakeholders through digital infrastructure. The section will focus on the life cycle
of a civil case and its progress through typical stages that such a case may
encounter to illustrate the benefits of a digital court. However, it is necessary to
note that the participants in the criminal justice systems can also benefit
significantly from digital infrastructure. The benefits of the approach proposed
in this document therefore apply not only to the judiciary, litigants, lawyers, but
also the police, public prosecutors, investigation agencies such as NIA and CBI,
and prison authorities.

Figure_ below illustrates potential use cases where proposed platform-enabled

services could fit within the context of the stages of a civil case.

68 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 69
70 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III
PRE-FILING STAGE

Citizens without legal expertise typically find it difficult to understand the

complexity of legislation and judicial procedure, and how it would apply to their
disputes. This can be addressed through the creation of a single online point of
access to judicial services, provided through a portal, and an app for mobile
devices. This would not only provide services but would enable citizens to avail
of them in an informed manner as described below. After utilising services
delivered in this manner, citizens without prior knowledge and expertise should
ideally be empowered by the knowledge they gain on the judicial processes and
the options they have to seek relief in a given situation.

In a digital court, a citizen would initiate the judicial process by creating an

account on this portal, and would then authenticate their identity through any
accepted government-issued document. Once their account is created, they
would enter the information pertaining to their dispute into the portal, in order
to learn about their options for legal recourse. Well-designed forms with
questions and drop-down responses, written in accessible language, can be used
to ascertain relevant details such as the cause of action and the value of the suit
(if relevant). Using appropriate data from the e-Courts database, the portal can
then provide the citizen with information on the justiciability of the case, the
court with jurisdiction over it, and applicable legislation.

Since the specifications of e-Courts functionalities such as ID verification must

ultimately be made open, judicial services can be designed collaboratively, and
non-judicial stakeholders can provide more input in the design process. Services
can therefore be adapted to specific user needs and situations. Multiple features
can be provided for differently abled users, such as audio assistance and text
display. Each of these would be available in local languages and dialects.
Information and instructional guides can be customised to local needs and
adapted to trends in litigation. For example, where land-related cases are
common, potential litigants can be provided with information on documents

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 71

required to prove ownership of property and can link to government portals such
as state land record databases.

Given that many citizens in India do not have access to computers, access must
be well-optimised for mobile usage. For remote places where access to both
public transport and mobile internet is limited, the portal for judicial services can
also be optimised for access through kiosks in court complexes and other physical
locations such as police stations. Further assistance can be provided in local
languages through a designated helpline.

CHOICE OF LITIGATION OR ADR

Once the litigants have a clear picture of the legal status of their dispute and
understand whether they will be able to contest the case in court, the citizen can
then be given information on how to proceed. They can be informed on the
differences in procedure, costs, and outcomes of filing a suit, or alternative
dispute resolution (ADR) options such as arbitration, mediation, or conciliation.
The ability to easily share and receive data with the e-Courts database means that
online ADR (ODR) forums can be linked with this portal. Once the litigant and
their lawyer opt for a given forum, sharing documents and other data with that
forum from the portal would be easy. Similarly, should the litigant choose to file
a suit for the same matter at a later point, documents from the ODR proceedings
can be efficiently shared with the court. The ability to share and access data
remotely means that more ODR forums can adapt to local contexts and can study
data to adapt to specific types of disputes.

E-FILING

When a litigant files a suit, they or their lawyer can upload all documents,
including pleadings and vakalatnama, and pay all fees via the portal or app.
Assistance can be provided through any channel that litigants and lawyers prefer,
such as through phone, chatbots, or email. The E-filing procedure must be
flexible enough to work smoothly on many kinds of devices, much like the pre-

72 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

filing information services described above and should allow for the uploading of
large files.

Special features can be added to the portal for lawyers’ accounts, to enable them
to keep track of their cases, and to plan and manage associated tasks. Allowing
seamless transfer of data between the e-Courts database and certified third-party
applications will enable lawyers, government agencies, and public prosecutors to
use custom litigation management systems to manage their cases. The advantage
of this is that these systems can be adapted to their specific needs, such as dealing
with a large volume of cases, the need to reduce the complexity of performing
tasks unique to specific types of case or performing tasks specific to their office
such as public prosecutors’. Templates for legal documents can save them time
and effort in drafting, and these may be recommended by automated tools, based
on analysis of the case data.

Reliable tools for authentication of documents can be built into the submission
portal. Linking the portal to government databases such as property records,
compliance filings under the Companies Act, 2013, and vehicle records can speed
up both the submission and authentication of these documents. Once documents
are submitted by a party are admitted, the judge can instantly grant online access
to the other party.

SCRUTINY

Once the pleadings and documents have been uploaded, they can be scrutinised
remotely by the registry. The digital formats of these documents can enable the
registry staff to use automated tools to verify their authenticity and detect
irregularities.

NOTICE OR SUMMONS

If the respondent is already a registered user of online judicial services, they can
be served with processes automatically, and may receive an email or SMS telling

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 73

them to log in and view the process. If they do not yet have an account, they may
be served processes by other modes of communication, such as SMS, post, email.
The summons would direct them to create an account on the judicial services
portal, and they can choose their preferred mode of receiving alerts, such as
mobile or email. The processes themselves can be generated using templates, as
is presently done in some jurisdictions. If the respondent has an account, the
information that they have already provided in the past regarding their contact
details can be automatically fed into the templates. Multiple functionalities will
be available for judicial stakeholders to use in this stage, such as updated versions
of N-STEP, ID verification, and scheduling algorithms used in listing of cases.

HEARINGS

Judges would be able to view and manage their docket in real time, through
judge-facing services. They would be equipped to do so in their chambers and in
the courtroom. Cause lists would be generated algorithmically, on the basis of a
combination of criteria, including subject matter, stage, and the urgency of the
specific purpose of hearing. These criteria would be used to determine the
prioritisation of hearings, but the cause lists can be reviewed and adjusted if the
judge deems it necessary. If the judge finds that a specific matter is more urgent
than determined by the listing algorithm, they can manually override the listing
algorithm and advance its date and time. The algorithm would adjust the cause
list accordingly and reschedule other cases if necessary.

Expanding on present video conferencing capabilities will enable more flexibility

in scheduling hearings, as dates need not depend on the physical presence of
parties or lawyers. Proceedings can be transcribed and recorded, and these can
be made available to litigants, their lawyers, and third parties online.

Parties and lawyers would be informed about hearing dates through the portal
and other alerts, such as via SMS. If a party or lawyer is unable to attend the
hearing, they will be able to request rescheduling of the date, which can
potentially reduce delay-inducing adjournments. Limits on the number of such

74 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

requests, as well as guidelines for acceptable justifications for them, can both be
specified by case flow management rules. Algorithmic generation of cause lists
and lawyer queuing, using e-Courts data, can increase both the efficiency and
predictability of case timelines.

During hearings themselves, judges would have access to a device, maybe a

laptop or tablet, to view evidence, pleadings, issues, prior orders, and other
relevant documents. It should also provide a convenient and streamlined means
of referring to legislation and prior judgments. The workflow for viewing these
would be streamlined, for judges to easily switch between and annotate them,
make general notes, or assign tasks.

In the various stages of hearing a case, including appearance, examination-in-

chief, cross-examination, and arguments, numerous functionalities can make the
work of courts and lawyers more efficient and provide more information to
litigants themselves. At each stage, litigants can be provided with information
online explaining the outcomes of their hearings and their potential impact on
the case outcome. These insights would be generated through analysis of data
from past cases in the database and could be provided via litigant-facing
dashboards.

DISCOVERY AND INSPECTION

In the process of discovery and inspection, lawyers can submit interrogatories

and applications for discovery to the other party online and can use both in-built
and independently developed tools for discovery. This enables them to benefit
from recent developments in data analytics and natural language processing,
saving their time in determining the relevance of documents.

ADMISSION AND FRAMING OF ISSUES

If either party admits to the claims of the other and the judge passes an order, the
order can be written using templates generated using data from past cases.

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 75

Workflows for judges can be streamlined based on the type of case, with tasks
and functionalities adapted to the demands of each type. In less complex matters,
for example, tools for writing orders can be configured to allow importation of
information from documents, and the judge would only need to verify this
information, unless they choose otherwise.

EXAMINATION-IN-CHIEF AND CROSS EXAMINATION

Witnesses can be summoned by multiple modes of communication, in a manner

similar to parties, as described above. Lawyers can submit their lists of witnesses
online, and the judge can remotely grant access to the other party.

ARGUMENTS

Lawyers can submit written arguments remotely and asynchronously, if the judge
sees fit. Oral arguments would be recorded and transcribed much as other stages
heard in court, and can be conducted remotely, via video conferencing.

JUDGMENT

Judges would have access to a range of tools to help them decide a case and write
the decree/order/judgment. The judge could indicate which party they have
decided in favour of, and for simpler cases, they could indicate their reasons for
doing so by selecting one or more of several options, via a checkbox or dropdown.
Templates for judgments can be suggested based on analysis of these inputs,
other data from the case, and data from similar cases that have been disposed of.
The templates could be based on textual analysis of both past judgments and the
templates’ usage patterns. Judges would be provided with a database with
judicial precedent and legislation, enabling them to identify legislations used and
earlier rulings in similar fact situations. Where the judgment refers to a given law
or prior ruling, online copies of the judgment that parties and lawyers receive
would link to them.

76 - KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III

APPEAL, REVISION, OR REVIEW

After the decree/order/judgment either party may want to better understand

what choices are available to them if they are dissatisfied with the outcome. This
information would be hosted on the portal, automatically provided to parties at
the conclusion of a case. Parties and lawyers can both view trends in outcomes
for similar cases, both in their first instance and upon appeal, to understand how
their case may proceed if they choose to pursue it further.

EXECUTION

If neither party wishes to file for appeal, review, or revision, then the court can
monitor and enforce the execution of the decree/order online. Compliance with
the decree can be recorded either when the party in favour of whom the decree is
executed declares it through the portal, or if the other party uploads proof of
compliance to the satisfaction of the judge, who can acknowledge this on the
portal. Interoperability with other databases can help verify compliance. For
example, linking with property records in real time can help a court verify the
execution of a partition deed.

KEY GOALS FOR PHASE III- 77

 OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

I. INSTITUTIONAL AND GOVERNANCE

FRAMEWORK

An enabling and strong institutional and governance (I&G) framework, is vital

to transform the citizen experience with the justice system and realise the vision
of Digital Courts.

In designing a sound, I&G framework for a large and complex initiative like the
e-Courts Project, there is a need to first diagnose the sources of difficulties in the
existing institutional structure. Further, to realise the vision of Digital Courts, it
is essential that institutional capacity be built to effectively design and rapidly roll
out the Digital Infrastructure, achieve and sustain high levels of reliable
performance on an ongoing basis. The I&G framework must also offer clarity on
objectives of the institutions, the roles, and responsibilities of different actors,
specifically determining who has the responsibility of decision making, and
designing the processes that will be utilised for information flow between
different components of the framework.

As we look back at learnings from Phases 1 and 2, we are cognizant that there is
a sense of implementation shortfall, with a gap between aspirations and
outcomes from the structures. When reviewed through the lens of institutional
design, critical shortfalls include:

1) Not Conducive for Holistic and Effective Technology Design:

Currently, the needs for technology development and design (of CIS and

78 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

 different services) are determined by the judiciary and communicated to
the NIC for development. Such a bi-lateral relationship results in the
design of the technology being driven primarily by the lens of the judiciary
and misses the perspective of other users, such as lawyers, litigants,
researchers, citizens whose needs and perspectives are critical for effective
adoption. The lack of an intermediary who can play the role of an
assimilator and designer results in the creation of services that are not
suitably designed based on the needs of all users.

2) Need for Functional Specialisation: The implementation of e-Courts

and the sanctioning of periphery modules at the High Court level are
currently headed by judges in the HCCCs or CPCs. As a result,
specifications for technology are driven primarily by judges. This results
in individuals who lack deep functional knowledge being responsible for
different roles.

3) Sub-optimal use of judicial time: The processes in place for

procurement of hardware and its inventory management, and vendor
selection are time consuming, rigid and complex. These are currently
overseen by the Registrar IT/ Registrar Computers or the CPC - and take
up significant amounts of time with similar decisions having to be taken
by each High Court, resulting in inefficient use of judicial time. There is a
need to support courts in managing the executive processes and setting
standards and specifications to be met by prospective tender applicants.

These issues are symptomatic of the absence of a strong dedicated team focused
on building technology- driven products and driving implementation, within the
judiciary on an ongoing basis.

Towards the adoption of a Digital Infrastructure and an ecosystem approach in

Phase III, technology will be employed to play a more transformative role. More
than ever before, this necessitates the need to ensure competencies and
functional capacities to design the infrastructure that could cater to the needs of

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 79

a range of different users (including courts, lawyers, and citizens), formulate
standards and specifications, manage day to day operations of building and
maintaining a platform that includes vendor management, monitoring,
complaint redressal, communication and outreach. Today, the judiciary has
officers who have a deep understanding of legal processes and the judicial
administration system. For the execution of large complex projects that include
mission-critical IT systems, it is important to complement the skills within the
Judiciary with specialised skills from the private sector.

I. TRANSITION FROM PHASE II TO PHASE III

The transition from Phase II to Phase III of the Project is required to be so

managed that there is no halt of activities or any disruption to the existing I&G
structure. This assumes critical importance given the heavy reliance of the
judiciary on its digital systems accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The development and adoption of the Digital Infrastructure is envisaged in the

following broad stages:

Stage 1: Design of the blueprint which includes principles, architecture,

identification of building blocks and standards

Stage 2: Development of the Digital Infrastructure

Stage 3: Implementing and adopting the Digital Infrastructure in at least 1

High Court

Stage 4: Implementing and adopting the Digital Infrastructure in 2 High

Courts, building on the learnings from the first pilot

Stage 5: Offering and extending the Digital Infrastructure for adoption in all
courts

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Given the development and adoption of the Digital Infrastructure will take 1-2
years, it is critical that the existing I&G framework, roles and responsibilities
continue to service the needs of stakeholders, accentuated by additional
technological and design capabilities, until a pivot is made to the blueprint to be
designed under Stage 1.

In parallel, it will be critical that the appropriate I&G framework be put in place
for the purposes of designing and development of the Digital Infrastructure
immediately and support its growth and adoption in the longer term.

Towards this, we discuss below certain principles that must drive the formulation
of the I&G framework. Building on these principles, it is proposed to create (a) a
time-bound transitory structure that can initiate the development of the Digital
Infrastructure in the immediate term and (b) an institutional structure that will
enable the development and adoption of the Digital Infrastructure in the longer
term.

II. PRINCIPLES GUIDING THE INSTITUTIONAL AND

GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORK

1. JUDICIAL INDEPENDENCE

The separation of powers between the legislature, executive, and judiciary is a

fundamental tenet of the rule of law in India. Keeping in line with the concept of
separation of powers while balancing the needs of a modern justice system, the
institutional structure must empower the judiciary to independently make
decisions governing its functioning. This includes allowing for close interaction
with other arms of the justice system (police, prisons, and legal aid), whilst
retaining strategic control.

2. FEDERAL ADMINISTRATION STRUCTURE

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 81

Although India has a single judiciary for the purpose of enforcing laws, it has a
federal system for judicial administration. The Constitution of India empowers
High Courts to exercise control over all subordinate courts within their
jurisdiction. In this context, High Courts have the strategic autonomy for
digitisation and configuration of digital services for their state judiciary. The
institutional structure proposed must maintain and enable such a federated
administrative structure while still enabling a unified system. For example, this
can be achieved by implementing an institutional structure that gives every High
Court the choice of selecting its technology service provider at its discretion. High
Courts may choose to work with the Development Unit of a statutory body
(discussed below) that will be set up under Phase III to build and create the core
Digital Infrastructure or work with any other vendor. Towards configuring the
Digital Infrastructure to their local needs, High Courts should also have the
discretion to create their own teams or leverage services of the statutory body.

3. FUNCTIONAL SPECIALISATION

The roles and responsibilities must be structured in a way which ensures that the
functional specialisation of individuals is maximized, while not exhausting their
time and effort in handling challenges outside of their core competencies. As the
judiciary lacks technical manpower with the competencies required to design and
implement a complex information technology system, there is a need to bring in
personnel with such competencies. However, introduction of external actors
must be suitably designed to ensure accountability to the judiciary and retention
of strategic control. For example, at various levels, the design and development
of the Digital Infrastructure, Platforms and individual solutions as well as its
implementation should be primarily driven by a dedicated team of experts.

4. ACCOUNTABILITY

A framework to monitor, measure, and report on the progress of a project is key

to its success. A governance structure with a built-in system of accountability can
help ensure that the judicial technology services are effectively tracked through

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the stages of ideation, design, implementation, and evaluation. The authorities
and personnel working on Phase III must have clear goals for performance
assigned to them in the beginning of each year. There must also be adequate
internal review mechanisms to oversee the quality of their performance and gain
feedback for improvement. For example, the setting up of a structure that also
allows for some services to be provided by a dedicated wing within the judiciary
while contracting for other specialised services under an agreement with an
external body allows for greater accountability and efficiency.

5. FEEDBACK MECHANISMS

Engaging with stakeholders and getting their buy-in on a project at the stage of
inception, while also continuing to engage with them during the implementation
and evaluation of a project, will play a crucial role in helping the judiciary realise
its vision for the judicial technology services. The I&G structure must account for
ways in which stakeholder participation can be ensured through needs
evaluation, grievance redressal, and provision of feedback. For example, given
the critical dependency on technology in the dispensation of justice, it is vital that
any instances of malfeasance or malfunctioning be suitably addressed. To this
end, it is important that there be instituted a grievance redressal mechanism to
adequately address grievances of users of the platform.

6. TRANSPARENCY

Transparency in the internal functioning of each institutional entity would imply

that a robust standard of documentation is maintained about its internal
functioning and the internal decisions taken. Such documentation should be
maintained and made public on the court websites to support an independent
assessment of decisions taken. For example, minutes of meetings of the
committees and decisions on vendor agreements. Equally, consulting
stakeholders should be a norm for critical decisions.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 83

III. TIMEBOUND TRANSITORY STRUCTURE

As the institutions constituting the I&G framework are set up, it is critical that
several processes are commenced with a commitment to complete the transition
within a period of 1 year. The following institutions shall drive Phase III of the
Project through this transitional period:

A. E-COMMITTEE, SCI

It is critical that control over policy formulation and enforcement be retained by

the Judiciary to ensure its judicial independence. Strategic control should be
achieved by having a strong dedicated team within the court inter alia to drive
policies, the choice to determine service providers or develop their own teams,

84 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

set goals for the team, supervise execution, frame appropriate contracts, and
conduct independent audits.

Composition: The E-Committee, SCI should comprise primarily judicial

members with a deep understanding of legal processes and the judicial
administration system. Chaired by a sitting Supreme Court judge, this committee
should be expanded to include representatives of High Courts on a rotating basis.

Roles and Responsibility: The E-Committee, SCI must be responsible for:

● Setting the vision, necessary policies for Phase III.

● Putting in place the Digital Courts Technology Office (DCTO), which is to

lead the design, execution and implementation of the Digital
Infrastructure in the transitory stage of Phase III.

● Review progress of the DCTO and evaluate the realisation of benefits on a

periodic basis.

● Coordinate with the High Courts, DoJ and other stakeholders, and provide
strategic direction.

● Facilitate the transition to create institutions of the bodies recommended

in this report.

B. DCTO (DIGITAL COURTS TECHNOLOGY OFFICE)

Given that the process of digitisation is of growing importance and will evolve
beyond the term of this project, it would be necessary to institutionalise a
structure that can enable functional specialisation while respecting and still
maintaining the federal administrative structure.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 85

A DCTO distinct from the E-Committee, SCI, will first enable the setting up of a
blueprint which includes principles, architecture, identification of building
blocks, standards, protocols and proof-of-concept studies, to design the Digital
Infrastructure based on consultations with all necessary stakeholders. It shall
ensure functional specialisation and be accountable for initiating technological
development. For actual development and implementation, it will manage
contracts with vendors from the market for specialised services while being
completely responsible to the Judiciary for committed deliverables and service
levels. In addition, the DCTO will play a key role in evolving model operational
processes and guidelines for the setup of the proposed institutional structure (in
a federated and unified manner) including assisting courts in identifying
appropriate personnel and roles for development, configuration and adoption of
the Digital Infrastructure and in order to facilitate adoption, coordination,
resourcing and adherence to timelines.

As a public good, the Digital Infrastructure and platforms developed by the DCTO
would be available for adoption by any High Court on behalf of the courts within
its jurisdiction. Adopting the platform architecture would allow the State in
question the choice to not only employ the Digital Infrastructure developed by
the DCTO, including Platforms and capabilities such as case registry, e-filing,
intelligent scheduling, summons delivery, etc but also plug into the national
shared digital infrastructure that hosts the ecosystem of platforms connected
with the judiciary (such as prisons, police, legal services authorities, ADR fora,
etc).

Policy formulation and strategic control will be retained within the Judiciary and
the DCTO should not in any way perform any judicial function.

It will be responsible and accountable to the E-Committee, SCI for delivering on

the outcomes of design, development, and implementation.

Roles and Responsibility: The DCTO should be responsible for:

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 ● Designing the high-level blueprint of the Digital Infrastructure which
includes principles, architecture, identification of building blocks,
standards protocols, and provide proof-of-concept studies, in
collaboration with and in consultation with a wide spectrum of
stakeholders and experts, needed to serve the goals of the project.

● Outlining, finalising and developing Platforms, including empanelment of

vendors/ companies for development and/ or implementation through a
managed service provider or otherwise.

● Liaising with HCCC’s to understand their unique needs, processes and

inputs into design of the platforms and provide guidance in setting up
their technological offices, if required.

● Increasing capacity of High Courts by ensuring adequate support for

adoption, service and maintenance of the infrastructure to the courts, and
guide in setting up Technology Offices at High Courts.

C. HCCCS

To advance and strengthen the federal administrative structure, it is desirable

that High Courts house a HCCC that is responsible for policy formulation and has
strategic control over digitization efforts in its jurisdiction. High Courts should
consider putting in place a strong dedicated team along with the choice to
determine service providers or develop their own teams, set goals for the team,
supervise execution, frame appropriate contracts, and conduct independent
audits.

Composition: The HCCC may consist of three sitting High Court Judges who
have interest in and commitment to digitisation efforts. Further the HCCC may
also invite technical experts, practicing lawyers from the state bar association,
and other relevant experts to be ‘invitee members’ of the HCCC on the lines of the
E-Committee, SCI.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 87

Roles and Responsibilities: Ideally, the HCCC could be responsible for the
following:

● Providing inputs on implementation of the vision and policy for Phase III.

● Liaising with the DCTO to share needs, processes and other inputs into the
design and development of the platform.

● Set up Technology Offices, if they choose to do so, to manage their

technology needs.

● Support the configuration and adoption of the Digital Infrastructure when

it is ready. The High Courts have the option of setting up Technology
Offices in its courts to play this role or seek the guidance of the DCTO, if
required, in doing so.

● Review progress of the Technology Office and evaluate the realization of

benefits on a periodic basis.

D. TECHNOLOGY OFFICES AT THE HIGH COURTS

Composition: It is desirable that this Technology Office be led by a person who

has expertise in development, configuration, and adoption of technology
systems. Such a Technology Officer would be responsible to put in place a team
of dedicated experts needed to support its mission. Ideally, the Technology Office
could be responsible for the following:

● Understand the unmet needs of the court and other stakeholders and
identify opportunities / projects for action.

● Ensure that technological solutions meet the requirements of end-users,

and are inclusive and accessible to all, considering the digital divide of
India.

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 ● Ensure adequate connectivity, equipment and hardware needed by
stakeholders.

● Provide inputs and feedback to the DCTO regarding the Digital

Infrastructure.

● If developing software for digital services, work collaboratively with the

representative of the DCTO to create the RFP, design document
formulation and select vendors.

E. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE (DOJ)

The DoJ will be responsible for necessary financial and other approvals from
competent authorities, and for disbursement to the E-Committee, SCI. The E-
Committee, SCI will be responsible to appropriately allocate budgets to the DCTO
and the High Courts. The DoJ will set up a Project Monitoring Unit to monitor
budgeting aspects and timelines.

IV. PROPOSED INSTITUTIONAL STRUCTURE

Based on the learnings from Phases I and II, vision for Phase III and principles
laid out so far, an I&G framework for Phase III is proposed as presented in Figure.
This revised I&G structure will be a critical foundation for realising the objectives
of Phase III.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 89

A. NATIONAL JUDICIAL TECHNOLOGY COUNCIL (NJTC)

Given that the process of digitisation is of growing importance and will evolve
beyond the term of this project, it would be necessary to institutionalise a
structure that can enable functional specialisation in the long term while
respecting and still maintaining the federal administrative structure.

Evolving from the rationale and functions of the interim DCTO, it is critical to set
up a permanent entity backed by a statute: the NJTC. As a statutory body, the
NJTC would have continuity in its policy and operations, be vested with
operational independence from the government, flexibility in funding
appropriations and constitution of its governing and operational bodies whilst
deriving its constitution, role, powers and functions from an Act of Parliament
according to sanctity to its operations. The NJTC will assume the role of a central

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body, to advance the unified (not uniform) digitisation of the judiciary through
design and creation of public goods and infrastructure for adoption by States,
prescription of standards, specifications, and protocols, and to afford assistance
to courts in adoption. In addition, the NJTC will play a key role in evolving model
operational processes and guidelines for the setup of the proposed institutional
structure (in a federated and unified manner) including assisting courts in
identifying appropriate personnel and roles for development, configuration, and
adoption of the Digital Infrastructure and in order to facilitate adoption,
coordination, resourcing and adherence to timelines.

Composition: The NJTC Board will comprise members of the E-Committee,

SCI, Chairpersons of HCCCs, independent technology experts, and
representatives of relevant government departments such as Department of Law
and Justice, Department of Legal Affairs, Ministry of Information and
Technology. The Hon’ble Chief Justice of India or a sitting Supreme Court Judge
nominated by the Hon’ble Chief Justice of India is to act as the Chairman of the
Board.

To ensure judicial independence, the judicial members must always be more than
half of the total number of Board members.

The body should be headed by a CEO who should be a professional manager. Such
a person should have requisite managerial and administrative skills in leading
high performing technology organisations for delivery of public goods.

The office of the CTO established as part of DCTO in the transitory phase will be
subsumed into the NJTC.

Roles and responsibilities: The NJTC is to be constituted with two distinct

units functioning autonomous to each other: 1. Design and Standards Unit and
2. Development Unit. The role and responsibilities of the NJTC would be to:

A) DESIGN AND STANDARDS UNIT

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 91

 ● Design the blueprint of the cloud based Digital Infrastructure. Outline,
finalise, principles, architecture, identification of building blocks,
standards, specifications and certifications in consultation and co-
creation with all necessary stakeholders including High Courts and
technology experts.

● Design the Digital Infrastructure for development of the digital platforms

with generalised and externalised capabilities and services for each High
Court to implement within its respective jurisdiction.

● Co-create processes to ensure interoperability of platforms and elements

of the Digital Infrastructure, subject to the applicable data governance
framework.

● Ensure the security of the platform and set in place appropriate protocols
for operationalisation and curation including APIs; and

● Standardise hardware through prescription of specifications and enable a

responsive means of procurement by High Courts autonomously or with
the assistance of the NJTC.

● Coordinate with representatives from the police, prisons, legal aid

authorities and other arms of the government to improve interoperability
of the new system architecture;

● Enable the formulation of policies on technology grievance redressal, and

coordinate with the Grievance Redressal Authorities in each state to
ensure unified response protocols and means of handling grievances;

● Offer guidance and recommendations to the Supreme Court and High

Courts for process-reengineering; and

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 ● Keep track of technology adoption and innovations in the judiciary and
publish periodical reports in the public domain in this regard.

B) DEVELOPMENT UNIT

• Building of the Digital Infrastructure and platforms to deliver the core

functionalities of the Digital Infrastructure as public goods, by
appropriately leveraging existing platforms and assist in the creation and
co-creation of interoperable platforms by High Courts and other
stakeholders.
• Outline, finalise, manage and monitor vendors for development and/ or
implementation of the Digital Infrastructure through NIC, a managed
service provider or otherwise. The NJTC will be responsible for
delivering on the outcomes of development and implementation by the
vendors.
• Create training and troubleshooting services to allow for High Courts to
appropriately utilise, implement, and operationalise the capabilities
developed; and
• Provide such services as the High Courts and the Supreme Court may
require in their technology related projects, including grievance redressal
and maintenance.
• Build a team with the right competencies and relevant experience and
capabilities. Such team members may be recruited from within the
Judiciary or from the private sector on a full time, part time, contractual
or volunteer basis as may be necessary.

In the longer term, the NJTC may consider hiving of the Development Unit to a
distinct entity.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 93

B. E-COMMITTEE, SCI AND HCCC’S

Composition: The E-Committee, SCI shall consist of a Chairperson and two or

more sitting Supreme Court Judges. The HCCCs should ideally consist of a High
Court Judge acting as Chairperson, two or more sitting High Court Judges as
members, and three Principal District Judges to be members on a rotational
basis. The E-Committee, SCI could invite technical experts, practicing lawyers at
the Supreme Court, other relevant experts to be ‘invitee members’, while the
HCCC, once constituted, could also similarly invite technical experts, practicing
lawyers from the state bar association, other relevant experts to be ‘invitee
members’ of the HCCC.

Roles and Responsibilities: Ideally, the E-Committee, SCI and HCCC’s could
perform the following functions:

● Prioritise needs of the courts and formulate key policies needed to advance
Digital Courts in their respective jurisdiction.

● Develop technological platforms- services or solutions, either through the

NJTC or any other external provider.

● Co-create processes with the Design and Standards Unit of the NJTC to
ensure interoperability of platforms developed with Digital Infrastructure,
subject to the applicable data governance framework.

● In adopting platforms developed by the NJTC, appropriately configure the

platform to its unique needs leveraging the services of the NJTC or build
its own teams and capability to configure the platform.

● Set targets for and review the efforts of the teams/ committees constituted
under it to ensure realization of benefits of the Digital Infrastructure on a
periodic basis.

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I. CENTRAL PROJECT COORDINATOR (CPC)

A full time CPC deputed at the Supreme Court and High Courts assume the onus
and accountability to ensure the adoption and implementation of the platform.

Qualification: A person with a track record in enhancing adoption of

technology which may be a person of the rank of District Judge or Senior Civil
Judge, or any expert recruited.

Roles and Responsibilities: The CPC shall:

● Coordinate the implementation and adoption of the Digital Infrastructure

and oversee day-to-day operations with the help of dedicated staff;

● Liaise with judges of the Supreme Court/ High Court and other officers to
understand their needs and propose areas for technology reform to the E-
Committee, SCI/ HCCC respectively.

● Design strategies and build partnerships to build awareness and train

relevant stakeholders including lawyers, citizens and judges.

● Report to the e-Committee on the adoption of the technology in the

Supreme Court or in the state as may be applicable; and

II. TECHNOLOGY OFFICE

Composition: This Technology Office should be led by a person who has

expertise in development, configuration, and adoption of technology systems.
Such a Technology Officer should be responsible to put in place a team of
dedicated experts needed to support its mission.

Roles and Responsibilities: The Technology Office shall:

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 95

 ● Understand the unmet needs of the court and other stakeholders and
identify opportunities / projects for action

● Appropriately configure and adopt the Digital Infrastructure developed by

the NJTC and develop any additional solutions, using API’s provided to
meet the needs of the E-Committee, SCI/ HCCC;

● Engage the services of the Development Unit of the NJTC or other vendors
to develop integrable solutions in accordance with local needs;

● Ensure that technological solutions meet the requirements of end-users,

and are inclusive and accessible to all, considering the digital divide of
India;

● Provide support to end users, including preparation of training templates

for master trainers in collaboration with the statutory body; and

● Address technology-related grievances filed before the grievance redressal

wing, liaison with the statutory body as required, and publish periodical
reports in the public domain in this regard.

● Identify and suggest areas for process reengineering to the PRC

● Ensure adequate connectivity, equipment and hardware needed by

stakeholders to adopt the Digital Infrastructure.

● Technology Offices at the HCCC must supervise the implementation of the

platform architecture by system administrators at the district level.

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C. SYSTEM ADMINISTRATORS AT EVERY COURT COMPLEX AT
THE DISTRICT LEVEL

Qualification: Persons with relevant technical expertise.

Roles and Responsibilities: The System Administrators will be required to:

● Implement and configure the platform architecture while delivering on

the timelines set by the HCCC;

● Consult with the Technology Officer at the High Court to develop any
additional modules or integration to the platform architecture as required
by judges at their court complex;

● Report to the Technology Officer on the implementation of technology;

● Report to the CPC on the development of new modules and the services
that the modules provide; and

● Report to the CPC on the adoption of technology and process

reengineering through the use of technology.

D. PROCESS RE-ENGINEERING COMMITTEE (PRC) AT THE

SUPREME COURT AND THE HIGH COURTS

As stated in the previous section, process reengineering is central to effectively

move towards Digital Courts and the NJTCSA shall provide guidance on
opportunities for action and best practices nationwide relating to this exercise.
However, it is critical to have bodies at each of the Supreme Court and High
Courts as processes differ widely between jurisdictions and the authority to
amend local relevant rules vests with the Supreme Court or High Courts in their
respective jurisdictions. In this context, it is critical that the Supreme Court and

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 97

High Courts constitute a permanent body that independently analyse and modify
relevant rules and guidelines to effectuate the application of automated or
transformative technologies and recommend amendment to applicable laws.

Composition: The Supreme Court and High Courts may constitute the PRC
under the E-Committee, SCI / HCCC or as a separate committee. The PRC may
consist of sitting judges, retired judges, and shall also have as members, experts
with relevant technological, processes and legal experience to analyse and
suggest changes for process re-engineering.

Roles and Responsibilities: The responsibilities of the PRC would be to:

● Assess existing processes to identify those which need to be changed to

improve efficiency and accountability;

● Carry out frequent structured interactions with judges, lawyers, and

litigants to understand their needs and experiences to improve existing
processes;

● Understand the impact of potential changes to various stakeholders and

how any negative impact can be prevented.

● Suggest relevant amendments to existing rules and in consultation with

other relevant committees, draft new rules to enable implementation of
the re-engineered processes.

● Suggest relevant amendments to procedural laws.

E. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE (DOJ)

The DoJ will be responsible for necessary financial and other approvals from
competent authorities, and for disbursement to the High Courts. The E-
Committee, SCI will be responsible to make necessary allocation of funds to the

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NJTC and the High Courts for development and adoption of the Digital Platform.
In addition, High Courts may leverage funding from the state departments to
support their efforts.

Separately, specialisation in judicial administration is a need that has been widely

acknowledged within the judicial system. In tandem with the changes in the I&G
framework, we recommend that courts in the country consider the most
appropriate methods of ensuring the appointment of specialised personnel who
are trained in management, technology administration and judicial processes.
This may take the form of a specialised cadre of persons who will be suitably
trained for this task through appropriate modules in dedicated judicial and legal
education programmes at graduate and post-graduate level, as well as in-service
training.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 99

 II. CHANGE MANAGEMENT AND ADOPTION

Affecting transformation in a complex public system such as the judicial system

will be challenging. It is thus necessary to put in place change management
processes to enable smooth adoption, reduce any unintended negative
consequences and achieve its objectives in a time-bound and effective manner.
These change management processes are necessary at four levels:

1. LAW AND POLICY FRAMEWORK: Given that Phase III envisages

digitisation of processes and establishment of digital courts, a vast amount of
data is going to be generated across various levels. It is therefore essential that
such data which includes sensitive, personal information of various stakeholders,
is managed well and protected from misuse. Towards this, a key requirement is
the development of suitable legal frameworks and policies to govern all data
controlled by the judiciary. This framework will aim to address concerns
regarding privacy of individuals, exchange of data between platforms and lay
down standards for collection, storage, retrieval, access and archival of judicial
data.

2. TECHNOLOGY: Although Phase III will build on the progress made in the
previous phases of the e-Courts project, it will involve significant technological
changes. Given the crucial function performed by the judiciary, it is important
that these technological changes are rolled out in a manner that does not disrupt
the functioning of the judiciary and allows for the training and skilling of the
users of the system. Any such technological change will be backed by the
regulations and guidelines laid down under the data governance framework.

3. HUMAN RESOURCES: The reforms envisaged in Phase III of the e-Courts

project must evolve the organisational culture across all levels of the judiciary.
Such reforms cannot be imposed in a top-down manner and will require deep
engagement with all stakeholders. To ensure effective engagement of all

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stakeholders, there is a need to bolster dialogue among them in all parts and
levels of the judiciary.

4. INSTITUTIONS: Phase III envisages the establishment of certain new

institutions which will change the nature of the institutional arrangements within
courts. This will also change the working and reporting relationships between
various stakeholders and introduce several new actors in the system. The change
to these new institutional arrangements will need to be managed with care and
through deep engagement with the relevant stakeholders.

Effective change management will require the following four elements to be in

place from the very beginning:

1. COMMITTED LEADERSHIP

The role of leadership in driving change is indisputable. Committed leadership is

required for change management across technology, human resources and
institutions. Judges of the Supreme Court and High Courts will need to own the
reforms and communicate a comprehensive change vision and establish clear
norms about how changes will be implemented.

2. COMPELLING COMMUNICATION PLAN

Proactive and compelling communication is essential to introduce stakeholders

to the vision and its rollout, explain its benefits and reduce resistance. Regular
forums should be created at the Supreme Court, High Court and district court
levels where judges and non-judicial staff, lawyers, citizens and other users can
give feedback on the tools and services rolled out. Periodic consultations should
be held where these stakeholders are given an opportunity to voice their
concerns.

3. CROSS-FUNCTIONAL TEAMS

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Studies of change management in the public sector have revealed the
contribution of cross-functional teams towards improved organisational
performance, and the production of novel outputs brought about by combining
expertise from a range of sources. Cross-functional teams will enable
institutional change management to be a richer process. The implementation of
this project will need people who have expertise in law, judicial processes,
research, project management, and technology.

4. REGULAR MONITORING

It is important to monitor the performance of all the stakeholders through the

implementation process to ensure they are adhering to the change plans. Regular
monitoring is essential for all three levels of change management. Monitoring
plan, adherence, and following up on deviations from the plan as well as building
in adaptability are key to successful change management efforts. Objective and
quantified metrics should be used for monitoring the progress of
implementation. The Monitoring and Evaluation Framework section provides a
detailed roadmap for this.

Ensuring appropriate adoption of technology across stakeholders is central and

critical to realising the digital future of courts. The following guiding principles
will be key to ensuring successful adoption of the Digital Courts by judges, court
staff, lawyers and citizens:

PRINCIPLES

1. DRIVE END-USER ENGAGEMENT

Catalysing adoption will be a continuous mission as the Digital Infrastructure is

developed and rolled out. This can be achieved through the use of incentives,
behavioural nudges and spread of awareness via creative offline and online
channels and proactive steps (e.g., workshops, incentives, YouTube videos in
different languages, etc.) to onboard and retain users from diverse socio-

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economic backgrounds. For example, to incentivise lawyers and clients to opt for
e-filing, the cost savings from e-filings (e.g., costs related to scanning, handling
paper books, etc.) may be passed on to litigants in terms of reduced court fees.

2. FACILITATE ONBOARDING OF JUDGES AND REGISTRARS

The design must allow court staff, registrars, and judges to be onboarded in a
phased manner. For example, through helplines, standard onboarding
procedures can be made available, along with onboarding toolkits, and dedicated
and easily accessible support teams.

3. ENABLE GRIEVANCE REDRESSAL

Enabling and addressing feedback in real-time and in a continuous manner is

central to improving the platform and accelerating adoption. So is defining
accessible and transparent mechanisms for grievance redressal, i.e., defined
interfaces, processes, and responsible entities, with a strong focus on actions for
resolution. Such facilities will be available both offline and online, and accessible
for all litigants including litigants with physical or situational disabilities.

4. ENABLE VALUE EXCHANGES

Beyond the value of the service being opted for (such as e-filing, digital payments
or digital hearings), every interaction through Digital Courts needs to be relevant
and valuable to the participants (such as judges, court staff and citizens) at every
stage of the process. For example, when making an e-filing, a lawyer or a citizen
can get information from the system on the estimated time for the next stage in
the process (filing to scrutiny) or average time taken for resolution of such
matters in the court. Facilitating such valuable interactions can enable the
adoption of Digital Courts and also encourage actors to engage in more valuable
interactions.

5. FOCUS ON INCREMENTAL CHANGES

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Uncertainty is the only certainty at scale. Addressing uncertainty is an evolving
process, especially when it involves actors with diverse backgrounds. Introducing
incremental changes rather than expecting people to make sudden radical shifts
in behaviour can induce routine changes in individuals and institutions. It allows
for the assessment of solutions and making necessary changes. It is also easier to
implement without overburdening the system with changes.

6. ENSURE DISCOVERABILITY

Discoverability is the ease with which users can find relevant services and
processes. For example, enabling tagging and description of documents could be
useful for judges and lawyers. Similarly, enabling a lawyer or litigant to easily
discover all the cases they are involved in and their status, will help them plan
their litigation strategy and approach. This could increase the participation of
users in different administrative processes.

7. EMPOWER WITH DATA

Providing access and ownership access to data to the users is critical for the
adoption of any service or process. Case information such as metadata, orders
and judgements should be made public and accessible on the internet, subject to
statutory limitations concerning privacy and confidentiality. Pleadings, evidence,
and documentation in all cases can be made accessible to authorised users online
subject to orders of the court and consent of parties. This will be in addition to
existing mechanisms for gaining access to court documents. Having access and
ownership to the data provides the participants with the ability to decide who can
access or make use of the data.

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ACTION

1. SPREAD AWARENESS THROUGH A HOST OF PARTNERSHIPS

For the effectiveness of any service, it is critical that users, especially lawyers and
litigants, are aware of them. To enable widespread awareness of such new
services as and when they are launched, courts can partner with a range of
institutions and organisations, such as legal aid authorities, local non-profit
organisations, bar council associations, universities, media, and others. For
example, when e-filing services are launched, a court must create simplified
content (visual and video) in local language in partnership with local bar
associations and non-profit organizations to spread awareness among lawyers
and citizens respectively. Their networks will spread awareness and enable
onboarding of lawyers and litigants on to the platform.

2. OFFER TRAINING ON USING NEW SERVICES

As new services are launched, in the short and long-term, mechanisms to support
onboarding of judges, court staff and lawyers will be essential. Training in
specifics of technology will be required, as well as training videos, modules, and
guides to familiarise users to a different way of functioning. Training
material/curricula should be updated frequently and provided to judges and
court staff as often as is necessary to keep pace with technological developments.
To ensure immediate adoption, judicial academies can continue to function as
nodal agencies, along with the e-committees, to create and roll out training
programmes catering to judges, registrars, and court staff. IT experts as faculty
in judicial academies can help make this permanent.

SOPs for training can make it more efficient and streamlined. The training for
trainers’ model can be adopted for lawyers in coordination with local bar
associations. This would entail a few lawyers being trained, who would then train
larger groups of lawyers locally. Such training programmes in coordination with
local bar associations can also extend to lawyers’ clerks by providing certification

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 105

programmes. This can also help lawyers’ clerks progress in their career. Several
online legal and technology training platforms exist, and the courts can consider
leveraging them and customising them to context. Such training programmes can
be conducted online till it is possible to conduct them offline.

3. PUT IN PLACE SYSTEMS FOR FEEDBACK AND COMPLAINT

REDRESSAL

Building systems and processes to take real-time feedback will be critical to

improve adoption and evolve systems and instil trust. In the e-filing or digital
hearing applications adopted, courts can create a space for lawyers and citizens
to share their feedback and adopt transparent processes to create visibility of
complaints received and their status of redressal. Further, a separate help desk
for lawyers and citizens to share their feedback, and a team to support timely
complaint redressal via email, phone or chat will be critical.

4. LEVERAGE COMMON SERVICE CENTRES (CSCS) TO EXTEND

SERVICES

The courts can leverage the wide network of CSCs that offer web enabled e-
governance services in rural areas, to bridge the geographical and digital divide.
Most of these CSCs are run and managed by the Information Technology
Departments of each state and are already equipped with internet connectivity,
computers, printers, scanners and cameras. Through a partnership with the
Department, the services at the CSCs can be expanded to include e-filing,
payment of court fees, fines, penalties and other kinds of cost online, provisions
of notary services, machine-readable audio content of judgements / orders,
translation and video conferencing. CSCs offering e-Courts services would
require technologically competent staff to support citizens, offer online
information or help desk support, and facilitate training.

5. INCENTIVISE A SOLUTION ECOSYSTEM TO MASSIVELY

INCREASE ADOPTION

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To increase adoption, there is a need to focus on providing different modes of
interaction for the services available. By making certain APIs available for the
ecosystem players to build applications, users with different ways of interacting
with the platform can be serviced. For example, Digital Courts Application
Providers can be encouraged, like GSPs (GST Suvidha Provider) in the Goods and
Services Tax system. They are recognised and authorised entities that help users
to access GST services such as invoicing and filing returns. Similarly, Digital
Courts Application Providers can enable access to Digital Courts through various
other interactive applications, in a manner consistent with integrity of the judicial
system, and the imperatives of privacy and security of data.

6. FACILITATE CLERKSHIP SUPPORT FOR JUDGES

If the courts move towards in-person hearings becoming an exception instead of

a norm for some categories of cases or certain stages of proceedings, more
reliance would then be placed on written pleadings and written submissions of
arguments and case laws for these identified categories of cases or stages of cases.
This is likely to increase the workload for the judges to effectively scrutinise the
pleadings and documents without active assistance from the lawyers, which is
usually available during in-person hearings. This can be addressed by
considering engaging law clerks, at every level of the judiciary, as a formalised
system.

7. CAPACITY ENHANCEMENT OF CERTAIN FUNCTIONS

Given the transformative technological interventions envisaged in Phase III, it is

important that capacity within the judiciary to procure and manage such
technological services also be enhanced. Procurement processes, contract
management and the budgeting function need to be strengthened in parallel for
the success of the vision.

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 III. PROCUREMENT

In order to realise the immense potential of the platform architecture to be

developed in e-Courts Phase III, it is essential that the most appropriate vendors
be selected for the various tasks involved in designing, implementing and
rolling out such a Digital Infrastructure. Procurement should also be carried
out online through tools designed for the judiciary’s needs to increase efficiency,
accountability, transparency, and facilitate the participation of a range of
qualified entities. For this, the judiciary may consider several models of
procurement adopted by public agencies. Rules should be created to govern
every stage of procurement through such tools.

PRINCIPLES

The following principles should be followed in the process of procurement:

1. TRANSPARENCY

Potential vendors of goods and services should be given clear and consistent
information regarding the requirements of the specific project and the
procurement process. Access to applicable laws and regulations, judicial and/or
administrative decisions, standard contract clauses on public procurement and
the actual means and processes by which specific procurements are defined,
awarded and managed should be shared publicly. The selection of vendors should
be based on publicly available criteria, which are defined in a clear and objective
manner, are not discriminatory and cannot be altered afterwards.

2. INTEGRITY

Clear standards of integrity must be set throughout the procurement and

implementation cycle starting with the selection process. Steps should be taken
to mitigate possible risks to integrity through enhanced transparency, guidance
and control where exceptions are made to the open bidding process. Depending

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on the financial value of the transaction and the risk involved, there should be a
system of multiple-level review and approval for certain matters. This avoids sole
authority over decision making resting with a single individual and will introduce
an independent element to the decision-making process.

3. EFFECTIVE UTILISATION OF FINANCIAL RESOURCES

The utilisation of public financial resources for this project should be

accompanied by transparency and accountability. Internal audit mechanisms
should monitor the management of the funds used for this project to verify that
needs were adequately estimated, and vendors utilised the funds for the intended
purposes.

4. MANAGEMENT OF PROCUREMENT AND VENDORS

Officials charged with procurement should have experience with large projects
and should have the highest levels of integrity so that they have the capacity to
prevent mismanagement, waste and potential corruption. They should be
empowered to take decisions regarding the management of vendors. Adequate
policy/rules should be put into effect to ensure that there is no conflict of interest
while outsourcing any projects to third parties.

II. STEPS IN PROCUREMENT

The responsible authority may follow the following various steps in the
procurement process:

1. ESTABLISHING THE RULES FOR PROCUREMENT

Clear rules should be established to govern the procurement process.

Competitive procedures should be the standard method for procurement above a
certain monetary limit, since it drives efficiencies, reduces corruption, obtains
fair and reasonable pricing and ensures competitive outcomes. If extraordinary

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circumstances justify exceptions to competitive tendering and the use of single-
source procurement, such exceptions should be limited, pre-defined and should
require appropriate justification when employed, subject to adequate oversight.
Apart from technical specifications, contracts must provide for

● Support: Vendors should provide suitable support for the goods and
services they supply. The contract should specify the manner in which
such support will be provided (i.e., phone helpline, physical support etc.)
and hours during which support will be available. The contract should also
specify the maximum time the vendor will take to acknowledge a support
request and the maximum time they will take to resolve different
categories of requests.

● Monitoring: The parameters of the contracts should be monitored on a

periodic basis. In the event the performance of the goods/services
deteriorates significantly during the contract and if a vendor does not
implement immediate measures to rectify these issues to the satisfaction
of the contract manager, then appropriate penalties should be imposed.

2. EVALUATION

The results of the procurement process should be assessed periodically and

consistently. Consistent, up-to-date, and reliable information and use data on
prior procurements, particularly regarding price and overall costs, in structuring
new needs assessments, creating a source of insight to guide future procurement
decisions. Indicators to measure performance, effectiveness, and savings of the
public procurement system for benchmarking and to support strategic policy
making on public procurement, must also be tracked.

3. GRIEVANCE REDRESSAL

There should be a grievance redressal mechanism that can handle complaints

regarding procurement in a fair, timely and transparent way through the

110 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

establishment of effective courses of action for challenging procurement
decisions to correct defects, prevent wrong-doing and build confidence of bidders
in the integrity and fairness of the procurement system. There should be a system
of effective and enforceable sanctions for public officials or vendors found to have
committed any violation of the procurement rules to provide adequate deterrence
without creating undue fear of consequences or risk-aversion among vendors.

III. CONTRACT MANAGEMENT

Irrespective of the method of procurement there needs to be a rigorous system of

contract management. Contract management is the process of actively drafting
contracts with the legal framework and managing their implementation to ensure
the efficient and effective delivery of the contracted goods and services. The
objectives of effective contract management are broadly to ensure that the
contract is:

● drafted in a clear manner, providing for well-defined responsibilities and

accountability

● delivered on time, at the right place and in the right quantity

● completed to the required specifications, standards and/or quality

● completed within the agreed price.

Over the course of time, contract management teams headed by a contract

manager could be set up at the High Court and Supreme Court. Such teams will
draft contracts and monitor their performance. This contract manager should
have a thorough knowledge and understanding of the subject matter of the
project and must be familiar with all aspects of the contracts and understand
their interdependencies. The contract manager may be hired in-house if
adequately qualified and experienced staff are available or may be outsourced to
a specialist contract management entity.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 111

 IV. SEQUENCING

There are two aspects to sequencing, geographical sequencing and sequencing

based on functionality. Given the transformative nature of the Digital
Infrastructure envisaged in Phase III, it is important that the geographical
rollout be staggered. Pilot projects should be conducted in certain test
geographies and such pilots should be evaluated rigorously. If such evaluations
indicate that modifications need to be made, then such modifications should be
made before the platform is implemented in other geographies. The second
aspect of sequencing is based on functionality. The rollout of the Digital
Infrastructure of the platform should be sequenced in a manner that core
functions of the judiciary can be digitally deployed at the earliest.

Several approaches to sequencing may be adopted as appropriate:

a) Independent: The implementation of independent services do not depend

on other services and hence they can be implemented on a stand-alone
basis. For example, transcription is an independent service that is not
dependent on any other service.

b) Interdependent: Some services are dependent on other services and need

to be implemented only after the latter is implemented and functional. For
example, the digital case management system is dependent on a functional
e-filing service being in place.

c) Parallel: Certain services can be implemented in parallel to other modules.

While these modules are interdependent on others in some aspects, they
can run parallel to the latter being implemented. For example, remote
digital assistance is dependent on digital case management system in
some aspects, but the implementation of the former does not require the
latter to be fully functional.

112 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

Given the complexity of this project, the various stages may not be implemented
in a linear manner and some stages may be implemented parallely. An indicative
sequence of implementation is as follows:

1. BUDGETING

The process of budgeting should be given priority since it is dependent on the

budgeting cycles of the union and state governments. The budget should be
prepared in line with the recommendations. Once the budget is approved, at
every subsequent stage of implementation there should be regular appraisals of
the expenditure to assess if the budget is adequate and if output planned under
the project are being achieved according to timelines.

2. APPOINTMENT OF THE CONTRACT MANAGEMENT TEAM

Once the budgets are approved courts may appoint contract management teams
led by a qualified contract manager. Given the importance of this project, this
team should ideally be working on this project full-time and should not have
other administrative responsibilities.

3.DESIGN OF THE DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE AND SERVICES &

PROCESS REENGINEERING

As discussed, process re-engineering is crucial to this project since it aims at

creating a platform that does not merely digitise paper-based processes but re-
designs (and in some cases eliminates) parts of these processes altogether to
achieve improved judicial outcomes. Process re-engineering and the process of
designing the various aspects of Digital Infrastructure (digital case registry,
making documents machine readable and secure, intelligent scheduling, and
ICJS) should take place in tandem. These are both iterative processes and will
both through multiple revisions. Of the various aspects of Digital Infrastructure,
ICJS and intelligent scheduling can be designed independently. The digital case
registry and making documents machine readable and secure can be designed in

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 113

parallel since these are interdependent processes. Once the Digital Infrastructure
is designed, the services (digital case management systems, e-filing, open digital
hearings, transcriptions, service of notice, remote digital assistance,
administration of legal aid, single source of machine-readable judgments and
virtual courts) need to be designed. Of these, transcriptions, e-filing and service
of notice are not dependent on the other services. Open digital hearings, digital
case management, virtual courts and administration of legal aid are dependent
on e-filing, transcription and service of notice.

4. SELECTION OF VENDORS

Suitable vendors should be selected, subject to due process for conflict-of-interest

checks, for the design and implementation according to the budget and technical
specifications. The most appropriate method of procurement should be decided
for each contract.

5. DEVELOPMENT OF THE DIGITAL INFRASTRUCTURE AND

SERVICES

The next stage is the development of the digital infrastructure. This development
should be for scale even though the deployment will first be in pilot sites.

6. SELECTION OF PILOT SITES

The process of selection of pilot district court and High Court sites can take place
simultaneously with the development process since the former is not dependent
on the latter. The district court pilot sites should be a combination of
geographically dispersed urban, per-urban and rural districts. Similarly in the
event of simultaneous pilots at multiple High Courts, pilot sites should be
representative of diversity. Once these sites are selected, appropriately staffed
teams with requisite project management experience should be appointed in all
these sites to implement and evaluate these pilots.

114 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

7. DEPLOYMENT IN PILOT HIGH COURT AND DISTRICT COURT
SITES

Next, the digital infrastructure and services should be deployed in the pilot sites.
The deployment should be accompanied by a rigorous evaluation system. The
pilot project team should be aware of the indicators for the evaluation system and
how these are to be measured right from the beginning.

8. PLANNING STAGE-WISE DEPLOYMENT

To make the process of deployment more manageable, deployment across the

country should be in phases. In the first phase 20% of districts in each state
should be covered. In the next phase, 40% of the districts and in the final phase
the remaining 40% should be covered. This plan should be harmonised with
ongoing efforts to complete rollout of earlier software such as CIS 3.0 and CIS
3.2.

9. EVALUATION OF PILOT SITES

After the pilot is completed, its implementation should be evaluated rigorously.

This evaluation should inform the design of the platform for the all-India
platform.

10. IMPLEMENTING PHASE-WISE DEPLOYMENT

This process should start only once the evaluation of the pilots has been
conducted and necessary changes have been made to the design of the platform
accordingly. The Digital Infrastructure should now be implemented according to
the planned phases. At this stage as well, the implementation should be
continually evaluated, and such evaluation should feed into the process of making
improvements to the platform.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 115

 V. BUDGETING

The budgeting process is not merely a means to plan and allocate expenditure, it
should be an integral part of the evaluation process of a project. Ex-post appraisal
of the expenditure under the project can be used to strengthen the design and the
implementation of the project.

Performance budgeting is the most recommended method of budgeting in the

public sector.

However, for a project of this nature it may be imprudent to link the budget with
outcomes. Inputs into this project may be difficult to link to outcomes in terms
of judicial performance e.g., reduction in pendency or clearing backlogs since
there is no clear correlation between such inputs and these outcomes and the
team implementing the project are not controlling these outcomes. For a project
such as this, it may be more feasible to link the budget with outputs since those
are in the control of the project team. The steps involved are:

● Identify all the outputs for the project. Outputs in this context are the
expected results of the planned activities for the project.

● Group together costs of achieving each output, including overhead costs

● Identify outputs in terms of measurable indicators to measure the outputs

● Collect data on the indicators throughout the project period.

● Evaluate outputs to gauge budgetary effectiveness and make the necessary

tweaks for the subsequent budgetary period

Designing and building information systems that support such budgeting and the
collection of high-quality data is key in ensuring that process and systems
transformation goes hand in hand.

116 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

 VI. MONITORING AND EVALUATION FRAMEWORK

A continuous monitoring and feedback framework is critical to attaining the Key

Goals of Phase III. Beyond monitoring the development and launch of services
and infrastructure, continuously tracking the qualitative and quantitative metrics
that indicate adoption and impact of the platform is of utmost importance.

For monitoring the adoption and impact of the platform, we recommend that a
dashboard capture, for all courts and services, certain key performance indicators
(KPIs). The KPIs will primarily measure two parameters:

• What is the level of adoption of the digital platform and services?

• What is the impact of the digital platform and its services?

The dashboard will be made available to each court to view their progress in real
time as the single source of truth. The outcomes of current initiatives, the targets
against goals (including key KPIs from the National dashboard) along with the
goals for future for the platform will be published annually by the E-Committee,
SCI.

Some illustrative KPIs for both the parameters are shared below. Different KPIs
can be prioritised and evolved to track different qualitative and quantitative
evidence at different stages of the project:

Adoption Impact

Networks Scale
Active Partnerships Access
Network Effects Adoption
Exponential Adoption Agency

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 117

Solution Co-Creation Speed
Value Addition Acceleration
Co-Creation Affordance
User Preference Acceptance

Shared Enabling Infrastructure Sustainability

Architecture Assimilation
Evolutionary Amplification
Data Empowerment Adjacency

INDICATORS OF ADOPTION:

NETWORKS

• Active partnerships: Whether relevant actors such as technologists,

designers, experts, bar councils, have been involved as partners within the
project? How active are such partnerships? Have key elements been co-
designed with them? For instance, were advocates/litigants/court staff
involved in the Beta version testing of any application that impacts them?

• Network Effects: How many first mile beneficiaries have created unique
identification numbers (UIDs) to access the platform? Is the number of
monthly user interactions on the platform increasing? What are the trends
of retention of users and repeat users? For instance, can the gg service be
tracked to identify new users, growth in traffic whether through organic
Google search, states with maximum traffic, etc?

• Exponential Adoption: Are existing users, such as lawyers, contributing to

more beneficiaries being added on the platform? Are external systems
integrating into the platform? For example, are the Securities and
Exchange Board of India and Reserve Bank of India pushing notifications
onto a common repository accessible through the platform?

118 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

SOLUTION CO-CREATION

• Value Addition: What is the core-value gained by users on the platform? Is

it being created online or offline? What are the key learnings? Have digital
services significantly advanced offline processes? For instance, has the
digital registry resulted in a significant reduction of maintaining physical
records thereby leading to a reduction of workload for the staff?

• Co-creation Diversity: Are private actors or other government entities

using APIs provided to create new solutions? How can this be amplified?
For instance, have any law offices created plugins to allow for ease of filing
from their internal platforms and dashboards?

• User Preference: Whether the platform has achieved the status of preferred
mode of availing of a service which is available both online and offline? By
mapping each part of the user journey for online and offline use, whether
the additional value through the platform can be identified? What frictions
exist in the current processes that are being eliminated? For instance,
tracking applications for certified copies filed online and offline.

INFRASTRUCTURE

• Architecture: Can multiple solutions be created on top of the existing

architecture? Whether the modular design itself is configurable to the
needs of different High Courts? For instance, where a jurisdiction requires
an additional means of authentication of a document during e-filing,
whether the architecture allows for such configuration.

• Evolutionary: Whether the platform design has witnessed additional

iterations since rollout? How often does the platform design, solution and
infrastructure get evaluated? Has the frequency of evaluation changed over
time? Court websites may be tracked for updates to evaluate their iteration.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 119

 • Data Empowerment: Whether the platform appropriately leverages data to
help amplify core interactions, improve benefits for the users and help
engage new actors on the platform? For instance, smart cause lists may be
generated to efficiently employ judicial time by populating cases at
appropriate stages of proceedings subject to the availability of time of the
concerned bench.

INDICATORS OF IMPACT:

I. SCALE

• Access: How many users have access to the platform? How many
registered users are there? Whether marginal users and those with
disabilities have indicated a preference for the platform? What is the
diversity of registered users? For instance, number of users across
geographical locations may be tracked, or their mode of access (website,
phone-based application, kiosks at service locations). Whether
appropriate standards (such as WCAG) have been adopted / evolved for
appropriate uses?

• Adoption: An indicator of the value of the platform as a preferred means

of availing services is the number of active users. How many registered
users are actively using the platform where offline modes of availing the
service is available? For instance, comparing the number of applications
for certified copies filed online and offline.

• Agency: How is the platform affording agency and choice to its users? Is it
empowering data principles to control their data? Is it enabling each court
to configure their own services? What is the percentage of relevant
services on the platform? What are the number of grievances/ feedback
and rate and speed of resolution? How many users have been onboarded
onto the platform through assisted means?

120 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

II. SPEED

• Acceleration: What is the rate of increase of users on the platform? What

are the number of transactions or services availed on the platform per
minute/ second?

• Affordance: How quickly is a user able to find and move to the page they
need to access? How well does each step inform the user of the next step?
How high is the configurability of the infrastructure?

• Acceptance: What are the ratings for different services? How much does
the platform personalise the experience for different users (lawyers,
judges, citizens)?

III. SUSTAINABILITY

• Assimilation: Has the platform and services been integrated fully with the
day-to-day processes of law chambers and citizens? Are judges and
registries relying on the platform for their everyday administration? For
instance, whether judges utilise templatised orders in appropriate cases to
be modified per a case’s needs.

• Amplification: Is the platform now used by a critical mass of citizens and

network partners? Is it available in more languages? Are systems in place
to proactively identify solutions for diverse needs / contexts? For instance,
customisation of N-Step to suit the dialects and needs of a specific state
and district would be a good measure of this indicator.

• Adjacency: Has the platform been integrated into other systems and
sharing data with prisons, police and tribunals? For instance,
interoperability of CCTNS with the requisite modules of platform
architecture would enable to track this.

OPERATIONALISING PHASE III- 121

INSTITUTIONAL ENABLEMENT

In addition to the above metrics for adoption and impact, it is imperative to put
in place strong feedback loops at the mission, system, and service level. Building
over the suggested I&G framework a key goal is to foster open communication
and exchange of ideas between the implementation teams at states level as well
as between District Courts, High Courts and the Supreme Court. This could also
extend to stakeholder interactions at panchayat levels to ensure adoption and aid
in bridging the language divide. Appropriate metrics to track the institutional
facilitation of such feedback may be employed. Such feedback/grievance
redressal mechanism should be accessible for all litigants transgressing digital
divide. The feedback mechanism should not be restricted to complaints against
e-courts services but extended to all facets of the judicial system including staff,
procedure and any additional functionaries that support e-courts services.

Some indicative issues where regular data and feedback for institutional
enablement must be captured include: Whether an appropriate system of
training for different users has been implemented? What are the number and
percentage of employees who have been trained across services and interfaces?
What proportion of the sanctioned funds for the project have been utilised and
the application thereof? What number and percentage of all sanctioned roles,
activities and competencies are filled? Whether any hardware procurement
requests are pending resolution?

122 - OPERATIONALISING PHASE III

 METHODOLOGY

It is a mammoth exercise to envision the design for the Digital Courts in India.
Therefore, the sub-committee adopted a multi-pronged approach of desk-based
research, focused group survey and consultations with relevant stakeholders to
gather data and information necessary for the envisioning exercise.

EVALUATING E-COURTS PHASE I AND II

Before embarking on drafting a vision document for phase III, the sub-committee
undertook an exercise in evaluating phases I and II of the e-Courts project. The
sources of this evaluation are:

● Multiple interactions with the members of the E-Committee, SCI and NIC;

● Interactions with CPCs across different courts to understand their roles

and responsibilities, as well as the challenges faced;

● Multiple documents shared by the E-Committee, SCI and NIC on planning

and implementation frameworks for specific modules under phases I and
II;

● Data gathering exercises through curated questionnaires for different

actors in charge of implementing the e-Courts project. These
questionnaires were sent to CPCs, Master Trainers, and System
Administrators:

The questionnaires were designed to gather information on the present status in

terms of the kind of technology driven services and systems deployed under the
two phases, the processes and protocols in place, and the implementation and
adoption hurdles faced by each of the different actors in the system.

METHODOLOGY- 123
The sub-committee had gathered information on the following points at the end
of the above consultations and data gathering exercises:

● Technology: architecture, details of core and peripheral modules of CIS,

API specifications, processes to ensure data fidelity;

● Administration: the designations, qualifications, roles and

responsibilities, and the hierarchy of officials in charge of implementation
of e-Courts project;

● Supporting frameworks: extent of process re-engineering undertaken,

training structures and schedules

● Challenges: shortage of trained and qualified staff, lack of adoption,

duplicity of efforts, inefficient processes, etc.

ENVISIONING PHASE III

Based on the learnings from the above evaluation of Phases I and II, the sub-
committee consulted several technocrats and technology experts to understand
the latest developments in technology and how they can be adopted in the context
of Indian judiciary.

CONSULTATION WITH HIGH COURTS

The sub-committee then prepared a draft vision document and the key takeaways
from this document were shared with the HCCC’s across the country. In addition,
the sub-committee was able to consult with High Courts. In these consultations,
the sub-committee solicited their insights into challenges faced, suggestions on
potential solutions and feedback on the proposed vision.

124 - METHODOLOGY
PUBLIC CONSULTATION

The objective of this vision document is to conceptualize a futuristic judiciary that

facilitates better access to justice. Given this, feedback from the end-users-
individual litigants, businesses and other entities was felt critical. Therefore, the
sub-committee published the draft vision document opening it up for public
comments. In all, 2051 responses were received on the draft Vision Document.
The sub-committee evaluated all the responses and made relevant changes to the
draft Document in consultation with the e-Committee.

METHODOLOGY- 125
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manual.pdf

2. E-Committee, Supreme Court of India. 2018. ‘National Service and

Tracking of Electronic Processes User Manual’. E-Courts. Available at
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Version 1.0’, March 2019

4. Richard Susskind, ‘Online Courts and Future of Justice’, (Oxford

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IV. Case Laws

1. Naresh Shridhar Mirajkar v. State of Maharashtra, 11966 SCR (3) 744

2. Justice K S. Puttaswamy (Retd) vs Union of India (2017) 10 SCC 1

****

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SOURCES- 1