Justice, social, economic and political” is the spirit and vision of the Constitution, which is enshrined in preamble. It is the duty of the state to secure a social order in which the legal system of the nation promotes justice, on basis of equal opportunity and shall, in particular ensure that opportunities for securing justice are not denied to any citizen by reason of economic or other disabilities. Access to quick and quality justice is one of the aspects of rule of law and justice delivery mechanism which involves judges, lawyers, litigants and court staff.

Management of court and case is helpful to reduce the dependability on the manpower and traditional resources. It creates impartiality and develops the integrity and propriety. Involvement of judiciary, cooperation from lawyers, rigorous monitoring and supervision of case progress are key points in reducing the pendency in courts and providing timely justice to the people of India, who are waiting in the process of justice. The cost of delayed process is not only borne by the litigants but it is also burden on the government. This cost is measured in both monetary and work hour terms of judges, lawyers and litigants.

Huge backlog of cases in the courts is one of the prominent problems that India is facing today. Cases are pending in the courts from Supreme Court to Subordinate Courts. Prime Minister of India and Chief Justice of India have noted their concerns on these issues and the government and judiciary are coming up with projects and measures to reduce the pendency in courts. The large amount of backlog of cases and delays affect both fairness and effectiveness of the judicial system. It then affects on democracy, rule of law and the ability to enforce human rights.

Backlog in court is a result of court delay and it becomes a further cause for the delaying the justice delivery mechanism. These delayed cases and deficiencies in the courts led to the growth of pending cases in such a large number that new cases cannot be dealt with as promptly as they could and should be. These cases get delayed and further culminate into the new pendency and backlog in the court which retards the process. Backlog, therefore, emerge as a major impediment to the court reform as it directly affect the court performance.

According to the data published in the ‘Court News’ by Supreme Court of India, the total pendency in the Supreme Court, High Courts and Subordinate Courts is given in the following table. The figures show that the number of cases pending in the Supreme Court, High Courts and Subordinate Courts are more or less same over the last five years. Although reduction in pendency is observed in the Subordinate Courts in the year 2011 and 2012, yet the trend is not same in Supreme Court and High Courts. It signifies the immediate steps have to be taken on warfront to reduce the pendency in the court and to provide access to justice to people which is guaranteed in our constitution.

Government of India and Supreme Court has taken several steps to address the problem of pendency in court. Establishment of National Mission for Justice Delivery and Legal Reforms, Formation of National Court Management Committee and E-court project are some of the example. The 13th FinanceCommission has also earmarked funds for these projects. With a view to enhance the efficiency of court management and resultant improvement in the disposal of cases, 13th Finance Commission allocated Rs. 300 crore for employment of court mangers to assist the judges. The post of court managers is created in each judicial district to assist principal district and session judge and two posts are created for each High Court and one for each Bench of High Court. The court managers with MBA degrees will support the judges to perform their administrative duties, thereby enabling the judges to devote more time to their judicial function.

Court and case management are tools which are used for expediting justice and reducing cost of litigation. The purpose of it is to improve the quality of the administration of justice. Today, dimensions of Justice are not confined to hear the case and deliver the judgment. It has become a judicial process which provides effective, efficient and purposeful judicial management of a case so as to achieve a timely and qualitative resolution of a dispute. It assists in early identification of disputed issues of facts and law, establishment of procedural calendar for the life of the case and exploration of a possibility of a resolution of disputes through methods other than trial court.

The issue of case management was discussed in Canada, where in the Lord Woolf’s interim report it has been stated that the ‘case management is a comprehensive system of management of time and events in law suit as it proceeds through the justice system, from initiation to resolution. It has two essential components (i) the setting of a time table for determined events and (ii) suspension of the progress of the law suit through its time-table’.

In India, case management was firstly raised by the Supreme Court in Salem Advocates Bar Association Vs. Union of India, 2005 (6)SCC where the Hon’ble Supreme Court suggested that the case management should be an effective litigation management and cost-and delayreduction.

Case management involves sorting of cases, scheduling of the cases according to the stages, setting of time table, follow up the time table, reduce the time lag and promotion for amicable settlement. Case management is nothing but the managerial attitude towards the cases or briefs in court. It requires judicial commitment and leadership, timely and qualitative disposal of dispute, identification of disputed issue of facts and law, exploration of other methods of disposal of disputes other than trial and control of adjournment and total workload of the court.

Monthly appraisal and evaluation of performance of the court system and procedure in a standard format is necessary to judge the implementation of the system. It needs to develop new strategies to expedite the justice delivery process. This will reduce the cost of litigation and will improve the quality of administration of justice.

Case management and court management have following advantages:

• It monitors the each and every case history and its stages.
• It finds out the issues which are affecting the case in disposal process at early stage.
• It enhances court’s ability to manage the litigation and adjudication process
• It reduces time required for trial through setting of time table
• It helps court to allow adjournment only if essential and court can impose heavy or exemplary cost on erring party
• It facilitates amicable settlement with the use of alternative dispute resolution mechanism.
• It reduces criticism of the justice system by ensuring fairness between the parties

In production management, it is always important to maintain the quality. Assurance of quality and its maintenance can be achieved by many techniques. ‘Kaizen’ and ‘Six-sigma’ are two techniques, if used in the process of court and case management many positive and sustainable results can be observed.