With the President, Chief Justice of India, and other judges of the Supreme Court in attendance, Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said on Wednesday that along with filling up judicial vacancies, the Centre feels that the time is ripe to have an Indian Judicial Services to recruit the best brains as judicial officers to man the subordinate judiciary.
Prasad was speaking at the inauguration of the Additional Building Complex of the Supreme Court spread across 12 acres at Pragati Maidan. The massive infrastructure will provide additional space for Courts to store judicial records, chambers for lawyers, facilities of Library, Conference Halls and an Auditorium. The building was inaugurated by President Ram Nath Kovind, who repeated the tradition set by his predecessor and India's first President Rajendra Prasad, who inaugurated the main Supreme Court building in August 1958.
The Minister complimented the Chief Justice of India and other judges of the top court for monitoring the building construction that began in 2013 and was completed at a cost of Rs 931 crore. He said that the Narendra Modi government was committed to building judicial infrastructure. In the last five years alone, an amount of Rs 3,500 crore has been spent towards the creation of courtrooms and ancillary structures.
What impressed President Kovind was not just the magnificent, energy-efficient structure but the fact that now judgments of the Supreme Court will be available to citizens in nine regional languages. About 100 judgments have been translated so far. The President hoped this would extend to other regional languages as he confessed this issue remained close to his heart since the day he became a lawyer. This also holds the key to access to justice as all judgments of SC and HCs are available only in English.
CJI Ranjan Gogoi dedicated the building to the people of the country and assured the President that the judiciary will ever be committed to the call for justice round the clock, through the year.
