If our business methods were as antiquated as our legal system, we would have become a bankrupt nation long back.

Lord Devlin¹

Information 25and communication technology (ICT) has become the sine qua non of efficiency and development in the 21st century. Government benefits from technology as much as private sector organisations² and the judiciary is no exception. This chapter discusses the e-Courts Mission Project of the government of India, which is aimed at ICT enablement of courts in India.

The biggest challenge for Indian courts is the huge pendency of cases. At the end of 2014, 3.06 crore cases were pending in various courts in India, though down from 3.2 crore cases the previous year. Both the executive and the judiciary in India have been au fait on the issue. Chief Justices’ (CJs) conferences have been emphasising the need to reduce/eliminate arrears. The CJs Conference held in 1985 resolved to eliminate arrears with utmost speed. The Conference of Chief Ministers and Chief Justices (CM/CJ Conference) in 1993, taking note of various reports of the Law Commission of India as also the report of the Arrears Committee (1989–1990), recommended that every state should establish a committee to go into the question of elimination of frivolous litigation and take remedial measures. The CM/CJ Conference of 1994 resolved that a management exercise be carried out in all courts to reduce arrears on priority basis including exercises on caseload management and court and resources management by working out a judge–case ratio instead of a judge–population ratio. It also resolved that time management be strictly enforced through reducing the number of adjournments and the time given for oral arguments.

26The CM/CJ Conference of 2006 for the first time acknowledged the use of various ICT tools and a modern court management system for reduction of arrears and speedy disposal of cases. The CM/CJ Conference of 2009 resolved that the High Courts will make scientific and rational analysis as regards accumulation of arrears. Deliberations in this conference, coupled with suggestions in the 230th Report of the Law Commission of India,³ resulted in the Vision Statement and Action Plan 2009⁴ which, inter alia, decided upon the creation of a National Arrears Grid for a scientific study of arrears. The Action Plan also laid down elaborate measures for computerisation of courts.⁵ In 2011, it resulted in the establishment of the National Mission for Justice Delivery and Legal Reforms⁶ in the Department of Justice of the Government of India and the National Court Management System⁷ in the Supreme Court of India.

The First Tentative Steps

Clearly, policymakers recognised the use of ICT as a facilitator in improvement of the justice delivery system in India. In sync with this realisation, efforts of the government towards computerisation of courts in India began in 1990 in the Supreme Court with a special dispensation made by the Planning Commission through the National Informatics Centre (NIC). A chronological account of these efforts is given in Table 1.

TABLE 1. Events Leading to the e-Courts Project

The unprecedented breadth and depth of the project threw up various implementation challenges. The court sites had to be ready for computerisation by provision of a Judicial Service Centre for electronic processing of case registration and movement of cases in courts, a server room with sufficient power back up, creation of ducts for fibres for local area network (LAN) installation, sufficient bandwidth for connectivity of courts with data centres through leased lines and virtual private network (VPN) over broadband procured from Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), adequate technical manpower at courts to help in the initial provision of services, and training of judicial officers and the court staff. The architecture of implementation planned to achieve this gargantuan task is given in the Figure 1.

FIGURE 1. Plan for Implementation of e-Courts Project

e-Courts MMP: Components, enablers, and outcomes

28The computerisation of courts at the end of Phase 1 on 31 March 2015 is given in Table 2.

TABLE 2. Hardware and Software Deployment under the e-Courts Project

Phase 2 of the project now envisages universal computerisation of courts in the country and delivery of services to stakeholders. A consolidation of all the initiatives and measures proposed to be taken up and installation of the components planned in Phase 2 will result in multi-platform services for the litigants under the charter of services. Services include, inter alia, case registration, cause lists, daily case status, and final order/judgment uploading which have been provided in Phase 1. Further, information kiosks at all district courts, e-filing of cases, e-payment of court fees, process service through e-mail and through process servers having handheld devices, digitally signed copies of judgments, and multiplatform service delivery to stakeholders are some of the services to be added in Phase 2. The Litigants’ Charter is given in Table 3.

29TABLE 3. e-Courts Project: Litigants’ Charter

30The key to the success of the project was now the availability of case data online so that services could be delivered, for which having a robust connectivity between the courts and the National Data Centre was paramount, as was the development of a unified software application. Alongside the population of courts with hardware, therefore, research into the application software continued in NIC.

Unified Application Development

Software was being developed at the instance of different High Courts from the time computerisation of courts began in the early 1990s. A variety of applications were being used across the country, each having different scripts and logic, and each suited to the specific circumstances and procedures used by the courts under the directions of the relevant High Court. This would potentially result in 24 different software applications, generating different types of case data of disparately defined case types in different formats and diverse reports; amalgamating them into one national data set would be a nightmare.

The genesis of the development of a common e-courts software programme can be traced back to 1997 when the NIC along with the Supreme Court of India developed the first software application in C language on Linux platform with dumb terminals. The entire project was on open source, a characteristic carried forward to date. Thereafter, preparation of computer software programmes aimed at the use of technology for automation of court procedures by the Supreme Court and High Courts has continued through NIC. In parallel, district courts started having their own websites and making available case data online on them. JUDINET was prepared and deployed in Maharashtra in 2006 as the first common data platform using data generated by the computerised courts.

The diversity of applications and platforms used was a challenge to comprehensive computerisation. The e-Committee overseeing the delivery of services under the project recognised the need for a uniform application for all courts in the country in order for the case data to be seamlessly integrated for all levels of courts and used for judicial monitoring and management. The e-Courts Project aimed to address this challenge.

In May 2008, the e-Committee decided to standardise and implement a common case information system (CIS) software application for the e-Courts Project. By April 2009, the e-Committee had decided that the best application for a unified CIS was the one prepared by NIC, Pune and rolled out in many subordinate courts in the jurisdiction of six High Courts: Maharashtra, Gujarat, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Assam, and Andhra Pradesh. Taking the CIS version as the starting point, suggestions on outputs/reports required in various jurisdictions were solicited so that changes could be made to that version to include outputs required all over India.

In consonance with the decision taken in 1997 to operate on free and open software system (FOSS), it was decided to use Linux based platform with Ubuntu operating system for CIS. The Open Technology Centre (OTC) of NIC has been providing support services for developing and tailoring applications on FOSS environment for the project. After making the suggested changes, the unified CIS was successfully rolled out as a pilot in Ernakulam in October 2009. It was gradually spread across all courts in Kerala, and by December 2010, to Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh as well. CIS was fully implemented in Maharashtra, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, and Karnataka by 2012 with uniform code and database.

31Other High Courts came up with numerous requirements not covered in this version. Though the Pune unit of NIC was strengthened to address the challenge, it was decided that there would be one software and one database for e-courts. In order to respond to some specific requirements of courts in certain jurisdictions that were not universally practised in the country, a National Core (NC) version would be developed and High Courts would be allowed to develop a peripheral version to address their specific needs. Since legacy systems existed on structured query language (SQL) server/visual basic (VB), migration script was written to enable migration of all legacy data on NC. The complexity of the application can be gathered from the fact that it has 1,245 menu items, 590 data entry forms/reports, 8,011 captions, 54 functional behaviours, and 214 menu items with behaviours. By February 2013, after a satisfactory roll-out in many courts, it was decided that the CIS version developed for the southern states would be called NC 1.0 and deployed all over India.

By August 2012, an exercise to unify the Delhi version had begun so that all courts in northern India could also be migrated to NC 1.0. Once NC 1.0 was ready for deployment all over the country, integrated project management was developed. The basic data structure of the application was designed in a manner as to enable unification despite the variations in the applications used in various states, and even variations within states (owing to customisations to suit the local environment). By the end of 2015, migration of case data under the jurisdiction of all High Courts, except Delhi and Madhya Pradesh, was completed.

Following the decision to implement Phase 2 of the e-Courts Project, work on NC 2.0 has also started. NC 2.0 has already been tested and is on its way to be rolled out all over India. It is more user-friendly, has a better look and feel, while maintaining the same data entry and report generation modules as NC 1.0. For the newly migrated courts, for example from Gujarat and Delhi, version NC 2.0 has been successfully deployed to avoid duplication of the migration effort. Thus, CIS application for the e-Courts Project has stabilised and is ready to deliver on its promise.

Comprehensive ICT Enablement of Courts

In Phase 1 of the e-Courts Project, the Department of Justice was responsible for strategic direction and guidance, apart from managing financial matters. On the other hand, the e-Committee, representing the user — the judiciary — was responsible for presenting its requirements to the Department of Justice (including customisation of application software) to the NIC, coordinate with the Supreme Court and the High Courts for resolution of implementation issues, and take the lead in process reengineering. NIC was the implementing agency for the project, which involved both procurement and supply of hardware as well as preparation and installation of software applications. An elaborate evaluation of the project was undertaken in order to assess achievements in Phase 1 as well as elicit suggestions for further improvement of ICT enablement of courts.

In 2014, the e-Committee finalised the Policy and Action Plan for Phase 2 of the project (the Policy Document)⁸ for implementation in three years. Since the judiciary, as the user, was best-positioned to steer the project, the e-Committee decided that it would provide policy planning, strategic direction, and guidance, while the role of the Department of Justice was limited to financial approvals, monitoring the budgetary aspects, and allocation/reallocation of funds across different 32components. Further, the High Courts, instead of the NIC, would be the implementing agencies so as to acquire increased ownership of the project.

Phase 1 provided for a judicial service centre (JSC), which acted as the central filing centre (CFC). However, there was no provision for a reception and enquiry centre where lawyers and litigants could seek clarifications on case status and get general queries addressed, for which they had to go to individual courts and sometimes wait until the court staff was free from their main job in regular proceedings. Further, computers are required for additional court-related functions, such as issuance of computer generated notices, summons, warrants, certified copies, general administrative, accounting activities, etc. Hence, the Policy Document proposes to double the number of computers from four to eight in each computerised court, so that all court activities can benefit from efficient computing facilities. All additional courts that have come up after Phase 1 was finalised, and are likely to come up during the currency of Phase 2 will also be provided similar number of computers. Further, process servers will be provided with handheld devices for efficient service of notices by courts so that proceedings can be expedited.

Courtrooms in High Courts have digital display monitors indicating which case is being heard at any given point of time. Similar display facilities are proposed in Phase 2 for district and subordinate courts. Each court complex will also have touchscreen-based kiosks at the JSC–CFC for litigants and lawyers to be able to access case status from a centralised location in the complex. Video-conferencing facility has been provided in 500 court complexes and corresponding jails in Phase 1. It is proposed to provide this facility to all court complexes in Phase 2. This enables courts to conduct remand proceedings without the accused having to be ferried from the jail to the court on each hearing, thus saving the state significant expenditure and reducing security concerns in transport of accused. Further, the facility can also be used to record evidence without witnesses having to visit the court. This will also save costs of state agencies such as forensic laboratories and hospitals.

Many other components of Phase 2 are aimed at enhanced ICT enablement. The case data is proposed to be hosted on cloud computing environment, thereby optimising server requirement as well as facilitating big data computing. It is also proposed to leverage national knowledge network⁹ (NKN), state wide area network¹⁰ (SWAN), national informatics centre network (NICNET), broadband, etc for seamless connectivity for courts as well as to take care of the need for robust connectivity options on the cloud. Mobile applications are being prepared for SMS-based citizen-service delivery. In order to provide uninterrupted power to courts, use of solar energy as alternate power source in 5 per cent of court complexes is being proposed. Further, integrated library management system (ILMS) using KOHA (FOSS),¹¹ use of data warehousing, data mining, online analytical processing (OLAP), and business intelligence tools for policy purposes are proposed to improve case and court management. By the end of the project, it is proposed to ensure availability of case data for all courts on the national judicial data grid (NJDG). This will not only enable better judicial monitoring and management by the courts, but also enable the government to use the data for policy purposes. Since district and subordinate courts use both the English and regional languages, it is proposed to have a bilingual module for data entry and report generation in Phase 2.

The ultimate outcome of the e-Courts Project is to facilitate citizen-centric services. For this, a Litigant’s Charter has been prepared, with services mentioned in TABLE 3.

33Data to Information: Benefits and Challenges

Once the exercise to generate case data was completed, the next step was to convert the massive data into information, and ultimately, knowledge. It was also necessary to host the data on a single portal for ease of use by all stakeholders. Thus, the portal http://ecourts.gov.in was created. This was necessary not only to make available the case data in identical outputs across India but to create the NJDG to facilitate judicial monitoring and management at the High Court and Supreme Court level as well as capture data on a single dashboard for policy analysis. This exercise began in June 2013. By August 2013, sufficient data had been captured on the NJDG for the Chief Justice of India to formally announce the launch of the NJDG. In September 2015, NJDG was opened up to the public.

The e-courts portal is linked to the eTaal, which is a web portal for dissemination of e-transaction statistics of central- and state-level e-governance projects including mission mode projects, and the portal has recorded 26.55 crore transactions so far since August 2013.¹² Thus, lakhs of stakeholders (citizens, litigants, lawyers, researchers, judicial officers, etc.) access the portal every month.

Through the NJDG portal anyone can access aggregate information on pending court cases in subordinate courts in India using the URL http://164.100.78.168/njdg_public. The portal allows us to drill down from aggregation at the national level to the state, district and court levels and individual case data sheets. This is of immense use not only to the judiciary and the government for policymaking and measuring judicial performance, but also to universities, research institutes, and individual researchers to undertake any analysis relevant for bringing in more efficiency in court and case management.

Some screenshots to illustrate data available on the portal are given in Figures 2–5.

FIGURE 2. Home Page of NJDG with Details of Pending Cases

34Figure 3. State-wise Disposal of Cases

FIGURE 4. District-wise Disposal of Cases in Bihar

FIGURE 5. Court-wise Disposal of Cases

35However, there are still challenges in getting a more disaggregated data set of details of pending of cases as well as differentiated case data based on the types of cases pending in courts. These challenges arise primarily due to the variety of ways in which cases are classified in various courts, the nomenclature given to different types of cases, the lacunae in the filling up of case data in courts and the fact that the e-Courts Project is attempting to coalesce disparate already functioning electronic databases into a single software application.

Let us examine the issue of case types first. In the High Court of Delhi, for example, there are 78 main category of cases, which are given a three- or four-digit numeric code, most of them having one to seven sub-categories with five- or six-digit numeric codes.¹³ The High Court of Madras also has numeric coding of cases, but with 178 categories, further divided in sub-categories running into 88 pages, each main as well as sub-category having a seven-digit numeric code.¹⁴ The High Court of Bombay, on the other hand, has 39 two-digit numeric case categories with numerous (about 400 categories of cases) two-digit numeric sub-categories running into 14 pages.¹⁵ The High Court of Karnataka, has about 500 case types running into 17 pages in alpha or alphanumeric codes.¹⁶ The district and subordinate courts generally follow the same listing and categorisation formula as the High Courts; some additional categories, which are relevant only for district and subordinate courts, are at times added and certain categories in the High Court list which are not relevant for them are deleted in district courts. Sometimes, specific case types are added in some of the district courts that may not exist in other districts under the jurisdiction of the same High Court.

The second challenge is that the case categories may have different nomenclature in different High Courts. Thus, a ‘criminal miscellaneous appeal’ may be called ‘CrMA’ in one court and ‘MA(Cr)’ in another. Similarly, one High Court may call a murder case a ‘murder’ case and another may call it an ‘IPC Section 302’ case. A case under Section 166 of the Motor Vehicles Act may be called ‘MVOP’ in Andhra Pradesh, or be called ‘MACP’ in Gujarat. 36It is a challenge, firstly, to harmonise the case types across all High Courts and across different districts within the jurisdiction of each High Court, and secondly, to come up with a single list of types of cases for which data entry is undertaken. It is a further challenge to give a unique name to each case type so that there is no confusion in generating reports from the entered case data. While the latter challenge can be met by creating behaviour control tables integrating state-wise application behaviours, the former is a gargantuan task requiring convergence of case types across the country. Keeping in view the relevant legislations such as the civil and criminal procedure codes, and efficient case and court management requirements, the High Courts evolve procedures and practices for all stages of court proceedings. These procedures and practices include details regarding nature and type of cases, subject categories, etc. For harmonisation of nature of cases, a process reengineering exercise has been initiated in each High Court. Once that is completed, convergence of case types will be attempted in order to avail the benefits of information technology to disaggregate case data for different types of cases.

The third challenge relates to incomplete or inaccurate data entry. As of now, data entry of cases is undertaken after court hours every working day and uploaded through the court complex server to the NJDG. Often some of the fields are not filled up or not filled up with the clarity required to fetch data into useful information to generate reports. In CIS version NC 2.0, additional compulsory fields have been codified to partly address the problem. However, unless data entry is robust, the problem will remain.

Finally, it merits mention that e-courts as an outcome is functioning in some form or the other since late 1990s in many district courts where computers were provided by the state governments or the central government and software applications were prepared mostly by different NIC development teams, as well as private vendors. The applications were diverse, with diverse forms of master data, transaction data, link and field labels, buttons, and messages. As stated earlier, these applications were also on diverse platforms. All of them had to be migrated to Linux/PHP/PostGreSQL platform with Graphic User Interface and a sustainable architecture. This was a daunting exercise, like trying to repair an automobile engine while the automobile is moving, with its engine running! The NC 2.0 version of the software is configured to express uniform nomenclature of cases through view control tables and behaviour control tables, thereby addressing this diversity.

Today, the NJDG has data entered in diverse forms with diverse nomenclature from which some reports can be generated by backend integration through ingenious programming. The NJDG can still however not provide reports of different case types. This is theoretically possible, but requires intensive process reengineering of all High Court Rules which contain procedures for case classification, registration, proceedings, and other functionalities of the courts requiring automation, and specific procedures developed in individual districts for generation of unique reports. In addition to the focus on facilitating automation of procedures in each High Court’s Rules in order to leverage IT tools, process reengineering will also need to work towards harmonisation of rules across all High Courts. High Courts being independent constitutional authorities, this is a desirable but daunting task.

With the exception of cases involving general tortious liability, petitions filed in courts generally emanate from a statutory provision in a central or state enactment. The court establishments all over India are divided into civil judges and magistrates (and their senior and appellate posts). Hence, at the level of providing civil and criminal cases 37separately, the harmonisation across the country has been achieved. For the rest of harmonisation across case types, results of the process reengineering exercise is awaited. The process reengineering exercise is currently underway in all High Courts under the aegis of the e-Committee of the Supreme Court of India.

Global Comparisons and Efforts to Meet Global Benchmarks

The National Policy prepared by the e-Committee of the Supreme Court in 2005 did not refer to or use any international benchmarks on the use of technology in court administration. No international benchmarks have been used in the policy document prepared in 2014 by the e-Committee for Phase 2 either. Still, the project has resulted in computerisation of most district and subordinate courts in the country, making available case data and orders/judgments online, thus instilling transparency and facilitating easy access to case information by litigants and lawyers. It has also established the NJDG as a tool for the judiciary to analyse court performance and for the government to take steps to reduce pendency of cases.

Nevertheless, some aspects of the World Bank Ease of Doing Business Index¹⁷ and the World Justice Project (WJP) Rule of Law Index¹⁸ may be relevant for assessing India’s justice delivery. Similarly, areas of organisational excellence for courts identified by the International Framework for Court Excellence (IFCE)¹⁹ may be relevant in making such an assessment. India ranks 142 out of 189 countries on the World Bank Ease of Doing Business Index, which is based on 10 parameters, one of which is enforcing contracts. On enforcing contracts, India ranks 186 out of 189 countries. The ranking for enforcing contracts is based on three indicators, namely, the time and cost of enforcing contracts and the number of procedures involved.

Singapore, Luxembourg, Iceland, South Korea, and Austria rank as the top five countries based on these criteria. Each of the top performing countries commenced computerisation of courts decades before India. Globally, one of the most common features of reforms in contract enforcement in the past year was the introduction of electronic filing. Greece, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Mauritius, and Turkey all made their courts more efficient by implementing electronic filing platforms. These enable litigants to file initial complaints electronically — increasing transparency, expediting the filing and the service of process, limiting opportunities for corruption and preventing the loss, destruction or concealment of court records. In Singapore the judiciary launched an electronic litigation system designed to streamline the litigation process and improve access to justice. The system allows litigants to file their cases online — and it enables courts to keep litigants and lawyers informed about their cases through e-mail, text messages, and text alerts, to manage hearing dates, and even to hold certain hearings through video conference.

However, within a short span of time, India has reached almost the same level of computerisation as the top performing countries and benefits have started to accrue to the citizens now. Lawyers are now getting cause lists online and in some cases even through mobile applications. Lawyers and litigants are able to access case status and copies of judgments and orders from the district court websites as well as from the NJDG portal. The public can also access information on cases pending in each court in the country, along with the details of individual cases. This information is available in an aggregate form for all district and subordinate courts which have been linked to the NJDG (which is almost 90 per cent of the total functional courts in the country).

38The indicators for enforcing contracts in the methodology for ranking by the World Bank relate to the efficiency of the commercial court system in the country without directly addressing the quality of the judiciary or the judicial infrastructure. As stated above, the enforcing contracts indicators measure the procedures, time, and cost to resolve a commercial dispute. However, the number of procedures involved in enforcing contracts would not be dependent upon court administration alone. Similarly, enforcement of a judgment given by a court and the cost thereof is not on account of court administration but enforcement agencies in the government. Hence, improvement of court administration may not by itself improve India’s ranking unless the factors outside the control of court administration are also improved. The e-Courts Project, by ICT enablement and making available case data online and through the NJDG will create an enabling environment for the judiciary to improve court and case management and monitoring the performance of judges.

The World Bank has envisaged that additional parameters will be added while determining the ranking in its next report (2016). On enforcing contracts, the indicator set will be expanded to cover aspects of judicial quality and court infrastructure, focusing on well-established good practices that promote quality and efficiency in the commercial court system. One of the new indicators will measure court efficiency. This will record whether the initial complaint can be filed electronically, whether case management is available, whether electronic case management is available, whether there is a pre-trial conference as part of the case management system, and whether process can be served electronically. Two of these components will be available on the conclusion of Phase 2 of the e-Courts Project — electronic filing of cases and electronic process service. The e-Courts Project will also facilitate electronic case management supplemented by changes in the court rules, as well as for pre-trial conferences as a part of the case management system. Thus, efforts made under the e-Courts Project, supplemented by policy, legislative and judicial administration measures should improve India’s ranking based on this indicator also.

Further, it is pertinent to mention that in order to holistically look at improving court administration in general and the stakeholders involved in achieving it, a comparative study of best practices in court administration globally may be required. There appears to be no such study at the global level at present. The World Justice Project prepares a report²⁰ on the state of Rule of Law in 102 countries, which includes dispensation of justice as one of the four principles of Rule of Law. India ranks 59 overall. Civil and Criminal Justice are two of the eight factors of the WJP Rule of Law Index. India is ranked 88 on Civil Justice and 42 on Criminal Justice.

Finally, the IFCE²¹ has developed guidelines for achieving court excellence. While it does not undertake any ranking exercise, it has a holistic strategy for court excellence. It has evolved seven areas of court excellence: leadership, customers, strategy, people, processes, knowledge, and results. The purpose of IFCE is, using the seven areas of court excellence, to provide for a path for improvement in the quality of the court and represents a methodology for continuous improvement. These are aligned with the objectives of Vision 2009²² of the Indian justice system as well as the various initiatives mentioned above; IFCE can help evolve a framework to implement this Vision. Further, a court excellence self assessment questionnaire is used by IFCE to identify what areas of court excellence must be addressed in the short term and in the long term, developing a roadmap from ‘what is’ to ‘what can be’. These IFCE modules can be studied and it can be examined whether India should 39join IFCE to benefit from their research and best practices.

The Way Forward

ICT in courts can enable measuring and improving court performance if used effectively by the stakeholders, particularly judges and court staff. Once deployed, it can make delivery of citizen-centric delivery of services possible through electronic means. Notwithstanding challenges to the deployment of ICT, the government of India has computerised most of the district and subordinate courts in the country. Not only that, it has developed and deployed a unified software application across all these courts, so that case data from these courts can be seamlessly shared in an aggregate form. Further disaggregation of data based on case types and universal computerisation of courts and bringing them on the NJDG is an ongoing effort of the government. In the meanwhile, the NJDG is functional, with data of more than 5.5 crore decided and pending cases and almost 2 crore judgments available to the general public online. This data is available to the judiciary and government for improving case and court management as well as policy purposes. Having started the e-Courts Project in 2007, this is no mean achievement of India, even when compared with similar initiatives elsewhere in the world.

Technology changes rapidly these days. Applications being used currently need to be constantly evolved in the light of new innovations. Further, there is a need to take a holistic look at the issue of court excellence. The government, therefore, cannot sit on its laurels; it needs to continue the efforts to further enhance ICT enablement of courts in the future in collaboration with the judiciary.

Notes

1. He was writing about the British legal system, but is often quoted by Indian judges. See, for example, the Report of the First National Judicial Commission, Vol. 1, November 1999, p. iii; and 117th Report of the Law Commission of India on Training of Judicial Officers, November 1986, p. 2.

2. Ken Miller. 2010. We Don’t Make Widgets: Overcoming the Myths that Keep Governments from Radically Improving. Washington, DC: Governing Books.

3. The report is available online at http://lawcommissionofindia.nic.in/reports/report230.pdf (accessed on 2 November 2015).

4. Available online at http://doj.gov.in/sites/default/files/Vision-Statement_0.pdf (accessed on 12 May 2016).

5. Vision Statement, pp. 25–28.

6. Available online at http://doj.gov.in/national-mission/national-mission-justice-delivery-and-legal-reform (accessed on 12 May 2016).

7. The NCMS Policy and Action Plan Document is available online at http://supremecourtofindia.nic.in/ncms27092012.pdf (accessed on 2 November 2015).

8. The Policy Document is available online at http://supremecourtofindia.nic.in/ecommittee/PolicyActionPlanDocument-PhaseII-approved-08012014-indexed_Sign.pdf (accessed on 10 December 2015).

9. Details available online at nkn.in (accessed on 22 January 2016).

10. Details available online at http://deity.gov.in/content/state-wide-area-network-swan (accessed on 22 January 2016).

11. See, http://www.koha.org/ for background of this library system software.

12. Available online at http://etaal.gov.in/etaal/CentralChart.aspx (accessed on 19 January 2016).

13. Codification available online at http://delhihighcourt.nic.in/casecategorization.asp (accessed on 10 December 2015).

14. See, listed as Subject Categories, available online at http://www.hcmadras.tn.nic.in/codelist.pdf (accessed on 10 December 2015).

15. This subject categorisation is only for the main cases, and is listed on the High Court website as Subject Categories, available online at http://bombayhighcourt.nic.in/latest/PDF/ltupdtbom20120111110606.pdf (accessed on 10 December 2015).

16. 40List of case types is available online at http://karnatakajudiciary.kar.nic.in/noticeBoard/casetypes.pdf (accessed on 10 December 2015).

17. The report is available online at https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/20483/DB15-Full-Report.pdf?sequence=1 (accessed on 15 December 2015).

18. The WJP Report is available online at http://worldjusticeproject.org/rule-of-law-index (accessed on 15 December 2015).

19. Available online at http://www.courtexcellence.com/ (accessed on 16 December 2015).

20. Available online at http://worldjusticeproject.org/sites/default/files/roli_2015_0.pdf (accessed on 16 December 2015).

21. Available online at http://www.courtexcellence.com/ (accessed on 16 December 2015).

22. Available online at http://doj.gov.in/sites/default/files/Vision-Statement_0.pdf (accessed on 12 May 2016).