TMB Report
Imphal: Former Acting Chairperson of MHRC Khaidem Mani has urged the concerned authorities to fill-up the vacant post of Chief Justice of the High Court of Manipur at the earliest for speedy trial of various cases.
Talking to reporters at his residence at Singjamei on Sunday, Senior Advocate Khaidem Mani said that the rule of laws is very important for good governance. The four pillars namely Legislature, Executives, Judiciary and Press media are important pillars of the democracy in the country. Amongst the four pillars, the role played by the judiciary is vital. The highest court of the state is the High Court followed by District and Session Court. The High Court of Manipur is supposed to have five judges- one Chief Justice and four judges. however, there is no full-fledged Chief Justice in the High Court of Manipur till date, he said.
The Supreme Court Colligium has reportedly appointed one retired Chief Justice from another High Court, who is now waiting for the recommendation of the Centre Government, he added.
He said that at present, there are three judges in the High Court of Manipur, amongst them, the seniormost Judges MB. Muralidharan was appointed as Acting Chief Justice, the remaining two judges is Ahanthem Bimol and newly appointed judges Guneshwor Sharma. He appealed to the Centre and other concerned authorities to fill-up the vacant full-fledged Chief Justice of the Hight Court at the earliest. Due to lack of judges in the High Court, lots of problems and inconveniences has been faced during the hearing due to overload of cases like 120-200 cases per day everyday.
While stressing on Lower Judiciary District and Session Court, he said that in Tripura state, the strength of the MJS grade-I, II and III is around 120 but our state have around 59 , out of the total, only 40 is functioning and out the total, 7-8 are under training. Still around 10 is still in shortage. He said as their is no new judges to appoint for the district and session court, the two retired district session judges were re-appointed for two districts namely Imphal East and Imphal West.
Due to shortage of judges, the district and session judge of Imphal East has been holding the posts of special judge for Prevention of Act, POCSO, Prevention of Corruption Act and Human Rights Court. Because of this, there is slow in the part of hearing. Stressing on Civil Judge Senior Division, he said that the number of judges is very less, as an example, one person were the judge of both IE and IW districts. There is shortage of various infrastructure and less number of court. Actually, the district and session court should be in every district of the state but most of the district have been in mix up. Every district must have two CJM and a Civil judge and a Magistrate. Because of various shortage in terms of court and judges, infrastructures, both the people of the hills and valley has been facing various hardships in terms of judiciary, said Khaidem Mani. He appealed to the concerned authorities to fill-up all the shortages whether judges, chief justice, infrastructures and courts at the earliest.
