More than 5,000 cases are awaiting disposal for 22 years or so in the lower courts across the country, according to statistics of the Supreme Court.
Therefore, the apex court have instructed the lower courts concerned to complete the trial process of the cases by December 1 this year on a priority basis.
The eight monitoring teams headed by eight High Court (HC) judges, formed earlier to monitor the trial proceedings of the subordinate courts across the country have recently sought from the subordinate courts the statistics of the cases pending since 2000 or before.
In response to that query, the lower courts sent updated information of the cases filed in the year of 2000 or before it.
An apex court letter sent to the subordinate courts said, "It is a legitimate expectation of the justice-seeking people that a case will be disposed of in time. The image of the judiciary is getting tarnished as the case is pending for more than 22 years. This is not expected in any way."
"In this situation the cases filed in the year of 2000 and before it needed to be disposed of as soon as possible on the basis of highest priority, except for the cases stayed by the order of the High Court. So it is directed to complete the trial process of those cases by December 1 this year on a priority basis."
At the same time, the subordinate court authorities have been instructed to send the details of the cases to the HC after disposing of those by December 1.
According to the attached list of the letter, a total of 5,861 cases are pending from the year of 2000 or before in the lower courts across the country. The highest number of old cases is in Dhaka district. The number of pending cases filed in the district before 2000 is 615.
Justice Hasan Foez Siddique on January 2, 2022, the first working day after taking the charge as the Chief Justice, said a monitoring cell headed by a HC judge would be formed for each of the eight divisions of the country in order to resolve case backlog in all lower courts and bring transparency in the judicial process.
Progress reports will be taken from each of them every month, said the Chief Justice, adding that older cases would be supervised and monitored with utmost importance for early disposing of them.
He, 25 days after taking the office, gave the responsibility of the eight divisions to the eight HC judges on January 27.
Justice Mustafa Zaman Islam was given the charge to monitor the proceedings of the subordinate courts of Dhaka division, Justice Md Jahangir Hossain for the courts of Khulna division, Justice Zafar Ahmed for the courts of Barishal division and Justice Md Kamrul Hossain Mollah for the courts of Chattogram division.
Justice S M Kuddus Zaman was appointed to monitor the court proceedings of Sylhet division, Justice Shahed Nuruddin for the courts of Rangpur division, Justice Md Zakir Hossain for the courts of Mymensingh division and Justice Md Akhtaruzzaman for the courts of Rajshahi division.
Eight judicial officers have also been appointed for eight divisions to provide the secretarial assistance to the HC judges.
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