‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:

Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.

By Syed Kamran Razvi

‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:

Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.

By Syed Kamran Razvi

Legal consultant and Coordinator, earbitration.net

Word Count: 3993

Corres Add: Flat No.7, Cosmo Apartments,

137B/12, Zakir Nagar,
New Delhi-25. India
Email: P: skrazvi@gmail.com
O: skrazvi@legalvistas.com
Cell: 91-9810078799

Bio in brief:

Practicing law in Indian courts and licensed attorney for past 15 years
mainly at Delhi, conducting some public interest litigation or social
action litigation. ADR has been my main focus for its applicability and
wonder it can do to the clogged and over burdened Indian Court
system. Developed ODR portal called earbitration.net and developed
compliance software for labor and environment.

1/20 Knowledge Global Conference, Apr 11-13,2008, Boston, USA.

 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:

Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’
By Syed Kamran Razvi

ABSTRACT

Courtnic started in 1995 with small objective of networking apex courts across
India. Initially functioning as intranet, now web-enabled application. It has
evolved from single use application to multiple interface application. Most of
the initiative receives thrust from government agency as part of egovernance
project. This project is yet to fall into domain of PPP. Yet there is mature sign
of increased number of users from different backgrounds making the
program/initiative successful. However there is lack of vision and where the
opportunity/space for private or ppp initiative occurs in taking the level one
court technology to wider applications with supportive changes in legal
apparatus like ADR, recognition of virtual applications in areas of service by
summons etc. More recently earbitration.net attempts to breakthrough the
existing status quo. The next space for opportunity in dispute resolution could
be right in palms of consumers/users with 130 Million Mobile phone
subscribers; “Justice in Palms”.

KEY WORDS:

ADR, earbitration, CPC, Courtnic, mediation, conciliation, Level One

technology, IT, Public goods,

ICT of ODDS:

The success story of 1.25Bn Indians lie in strange combination of odds. The
oddity lies in struggle of resources, allocation and use of it. ICT initiative in
India is one such illustrative experience. It is struggle to justify the use to
those who still are to get the access to basics of primary existence. It all started
in 1984 when the youngest Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s government
decided to introduce knowledge economy as integral to India’s administered

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

governance. ICT in justice system of India is providing reach to ‘Public

goods’.

Today the new challenge of ‘Digital Divide’ in India can be qualified as

infrastructural woes ie spectrum allocation and bandwidth size, coupled with
selection of corresponding technology. Fibre optic is the preferred mode for
broadband outreach in remote areas. One of the private company now has laid
the largest fibre optic network through out India.

Making of ICT policy:

In the 1990s, the stress on IT for producing wealth and enabling development
continued. A high power National Task Force on Information Technology and
Software Development was set up in 1998. This Task Force prepared the blue
print for making the adoption of IT a national movement, by establishing a wide
network of empowered taskforce at all governmental and non-governmental
levels. In 1999, the Ministry of Information Technology was established by
bringing together government agencies involved in different aspects of IT5 for
creating jobs to harness opportunities provided by convergence of communication
technologies and to facilitate the use of IT in use of Electronic Governance.
Taking into account the increasing convergence between telecommunication and
IT a Communication Bill was drafted by the Government of India, followed by
the Information Technology Act that was notified and brought into force on 17
October 2000. Moreover, the Information Technology for Masses Working Group
has been set up with an ambitious target of establishing at least 100 million
internet connections, opening up IT kiosks and cyber cafes for covering entire
India. A Task Force on Human Resource Development in IT was set up for
preparing a long-term strategy for increasing the number of well trained IT
professionals.
There has even been a Task Force on Information Technology as a Knowledge
Super Power which considers how India can become a knowledge economy
and society, for which the role of education at the level of primary, secondary,

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

and tertiary level is of paramount importance. Sociologically speaking it

seems that the concept knowledge society will incorporate how knowledge
will takeover the role of capital and labour in the economy1.

Early computerization examples:

The computerization of Banks (all Public undertaking then) and Railways
heralded the first interface between common man and civil servant in modern
settings. The Bank employees way back in 1989 decided to oppose the entry
of computers which would take away their jobs. Up till 2008 it has created
five major banks (private sector) and the branches have quadrupled not only in
towns but rural areas as well.
National e-governance project from 2002 to 2007, has been operational with a
whole new department of egovernance set up.

The Railway computerization (early 1990) meant for ‘lliterates’2 to adopt to

new interface without hassle of standing in the queue for 4-5 hours or travel to
town fore reservations and render brokers out of petty corruption that so much
plagues Indian social fabric. This was almost second revolution to first change
(1977) in Railways sociology when second class passenger was given the
cushions to sleep on. This was quite a replacement from the wooden sleeper
benches.
Indian Railways , moves 16 million passengers and one million tonnes of
freight3 with 1.6 million employees and biggest nationalized enterprise since
its inception in 1853.

THIRD CHALLENGE:
The third challenge for ICT but the first as fundamental right was taking
‘Access to Justice’4 to ‘illiterate common man’. Long before ‘Right to

1
Bajwa S B GBER Vol. 3 No.2. pp 49 – 61
2
A person who can read and write his name is literate according to National Literacy Mission , India.
3
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Railways
4
Fundamental Right under Article 19 of constitution of India.

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

Information Act’ was enacted and every department in the country and civil
servant made accountable.
Courtnic5:
It started from top6 as network and ICT initiative to connect the hierarchy of
constitutional courtsi. The initial objective was to provide access to the
Litigants and the Judges to the orders passed and received by the litigants
sitting at remote corner of the country.
Courtnic was inaugurated in 1995, which would then gradually approach its
second objective to become a web-based application. Thus making what was
complex affair to obtain in a simple affair without paying for travel and other
costs to obtain a copy of one page order or judgement and to know the listing
of cases.
Courts in India following British legacy in courts and laws, hear the matters
day in and day out five days in Supreme Court and High Courts, and six in
District Courts. It means long man hour days and costs of running courts.
This is unlike US courts of Appeal or circuit courts who hear for week and
work in chambers for rest of the month.

Computerization has opened new avenues for millions of litigants who would
like to know when the matter would come up for hearing and what time it was
likely to come during the day.7 In addition it also provides the new
‘empowered’ citizen some new options which would be otherwise
considerable waste of individual’s time and money. In a little way it has
introduced accountability and cut a minor band in complex corruption muscle-
like structure.

So much so by 2005 that in 10 years time of its inception it has made its
impact felt right across the nation. It has been of value to all stake-holders
whether Judges, Lawyers, Litigants and even researchers.

5
www.courtnic.in
6
Appendix A to this paper” Heirarchy of Courts in India.
7
www.causelists.nic.in

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

To illustrate the case further: India may be one fourth of US in geographical

area but it has population which is almost five times. The number of
litigations, almost match up the US numbers. A comparison below is briefly
provided for:

CASES in US courts:

State courts handle the vast majority of the nation’s litigation. (This) nation’s
courts—state and Federal, trial and appellate—processed more than 90 million
cases annually from 1984 to 1993. State courts accounted for over 98 percent
of these filings. In 1993, state courts of general jurisdiction handled 85 times
as many criminal cases and 27 times as many civil cases as the U.S. District
Courts, with only 14 times as many judges.

After a long period of growth, state courts reported a dip from 1992 to 1993 in
total civil and criminal filings. This respite is timely given that over the past
ten years, civil and criminal caseloads increased by 30 percent, juvenile
caseloads rose 40 percent, and domestic relations filings rose 60 percent.

In comparison, the U.S. population increased 8 percent during the same

period.

Cases in India:

The total number of cases, which have increased in India are not from filing
despite rise of population in India by about 15% from 1993 to 2007, but from
pendency alone and the total number of cases pending today in Indian courts is
about 25.9 million cases.

To cut the case load clogging the Indian legal system, every step including
many studies and projects by ISDLS, US to cut litigation has been adopted.
This is an ongoing project from 1996-till date.

The changes in procedural lawii, ie Civil Procedural Code, in 2002 were

made8. This was complimented by new enactment called Information
Technology Act 21 of 2000. The new IT Act provides legal recognition for

8
section 89 and Order V rule 9 of CPC amending act of 2002 (pl. see endnote ii as well)

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

transactions carried out by means of electronic data interchange and other

means of electronic communication.

ADR Mechanism:

Alternative Dispute Redressal Mechanism based on Case Law management9,

originating in USiii, having introduced, in 2002, wherein Indian courts were
making it as permanent step before adversarial proceedings could begin to cut
any increase in new cases adding to pendency.

Brief History of ADR:

Although mediation goes back hundreds of years, alternative dispute

resolution has grown rapidly in the United States since the political and civil
conflicts of the 1960s. The introduction of new laws protecting individual
rights, as well as less tolerance for discrimination and injustice, led more
people to file lawsuits in order to settle conflicts.[1] For example, the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 outlawed "discrimination in employment or public
accommodations on the basis of race, sex, or national origin."[2] Laws such as
this gave people new grounds for seeking compensation for ill treatment. At
the same time, the women's movement and the environmental movements
were growing as well, leading to another host of court cases. The result of all
these changes was a significant increase in the number of lawsuits being filed
in U.S. courts. Eventually the system became overloaded with cases, resulting
in long delays and sometimes procedural errors.[3] Processes like mediation
and arbitration soon became popular ways to deal with a variety of conflicts,
because they helped relieve pressure on the overburdened court system.iv

Delhi Mediation Centre:

A pilot project with the help of ISDLS10 on mediation was initiated in Delhi in
the month of August, 2005. The first batch of senior Additional District Judges
were imparted mediation training of 40 hours duration. The trained mediators

9
http://www.beyondintractability.org/essay/adr/
10
http://www.isdls.com

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

started judicial mediation from their chambers in the end of August, 2005.
Thereafter, 24 more Additional District Judges have been trained as mediators
during the month of September and November, 2005. A permanent mediation
centre with all modern facilities was established at Tis Hazari court complex
(Central Hall, 3rd Floor, Room No. 325) in October, 2005. Judicial mediation
was started at Karkardooma Court Complex in the month of December, 2005
and a litigant friendly and modern mediation centre was established in May,
2006. Eleven more Additional District Judges have been trained as mediators
during the month of June, 2006. A large number of cases have been referred to
the Tis Hazari Mediation Centre and the Karkardooma Mediation Centre (two
names of court annexed centre in Delhi)11. The settlement rate at the two
centres being over 60% is very encouraging considering that judicial
mediation is entirely a new concept in our country. 5

IN addition to Mediation and Conciliation centres in courts the concept of

Lok Adalat has been used introduced since Legal Services Authority Act
1987.
ICT in Courts:

In the beginning of the project the courts in India at top end of hierarchy i.e.
Constitutional and Appellate Courts were integrated in WAN. In less than 12
years of inception of ICT program in courts, the culture has seeped in District
courts located in Metropolitan areas like Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai and Chennai
and some other distant places inside rural India.
All new court buildings in these metropolitan areas are being equipped to
integrate ‘Level One’ court technology12. Acceptability is major part of
challenge, and putting it in regular use is yet another challenge. Some of the
important links to courts are listed in endnotes.v
However the major shortcoming of all these initiatives is the focus and utility,
which has very low interface value and limited scope for dynamism. The main

11
Italics mine
12
Court21 technology is the new version worked by NCSC and Prof.Lederer of William and Mary
College, USA.

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

agency responsible National Informatics Centre uses simple and dependable

old language tools to develop these technologies mostly Unix or oracle which
are easy to use, for its targeted audience.
Some other stake holders involved in advising the Legal contents are National
Judicial Academy and Delhi Judicial Academy, TIFACS of Department of
Science and Technology. Bar Associations and Bar Councils13 are still not
active participants.
Thus, limiting the use of technology to only information or digitalizing (then
described ‘Computerization of records’) the existing process only. The scope
for enhanced capability of such web-based application is not being explored
as the professionals from legal field are not yet integral part of such
initiatives.
Objectives of computerization14 can be summed as below:
(a) to reduce costs and improve the handling of uncontested debt cases;
(b) to enable the court to identify contested cases which are not up to
timetable
(c) to institute computer-generated reminders and summonses to dilatory
parties
(d) to improve forward planning of judge-time and listing of cases
(e) to improve planning of resource allocation generally.

Legal requisites:
Computerization of Court records and administering Justice was
complimented by new set of legislation to facilitate transition and
incorporation of new provisions.
In US, UETA15 does not override the existing requirements of laws mandating
of service of summons by way of post, sending or formatting of records. For
example, eviction notices generally must be posted where the tenant is most
likely to see it, right on the front door of the dwelling. Even if the landlord

13
Bar Associations are societies while Bar Council are the statutory professional bodies regulating the
legal profession
14
Book references ;Michael Zander p.120, quoting Consulation Paper issued in July,1987.
15
http://www.ncsl.org/programs/lis/CIP/ueta.htm

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

and tenant agree to electronic transactions, UETA cannot override property

law and requirements for physical posting of paper eviction notices.
UETA also permits the retention or presentation of electronic records to
satisfy these retention requirements, if the information accurately reflects the
original and remains accessible for future reference.
Indeed CPC16 of India Order V rule 9 relating to Service of summons provides
for method of service as mandated in addition to new mandated method by fax
and email.
ICT Usage:
Today each High Court in India has a separate budgetary allocation for IT
provisioning. Delhi High Court would have provision for about 20 Million
USD for 2006-2007.
TABLE A
Status of IT usage in different courts is as below:
Supreme Court Facilities for Judges and Facilities for Public
Court staff (Level One
Technology- wiring of
building)
1. Terminals for staff 1. Option of website
in Court rooms, which contains
PCs for judges in the information
Chambers and like causelists,
Home. orders and case
2. WAN status
3. Online Library and 2. First of its kind in
Judgements are courts efiling of
available. petition.
4. secure mail ids and
discussion forums
5. Item boards
High Courts 6. Laptops for 3. Itemwise panel

16
Civil Procedure Code of 1908(as amended)-India

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

Judges; for courts on web.

7. Research 4. Touch panel kiosk
Assistants or Court for causelist.
Clerks for Judges;
8. Wireless
connectivity
District Courts There is no wireless The item panel boards
only in few areas connectivity. are still not functional.
15 as existing However they have Also their websites are
Video Conferencing not updated regularly.
facility.
Revenue Courts Judges have EFILING is the option
and Tax Tribunals Terminals. for Tax courts and their
However no facilities websites are updated
with the Field staff on daily basis
except in few areas.
Land records have
been computerized and
placed on websites
updated upto two
months before and are
readily available for
print out and email
options.
At present only ten
states out of 25 have
this facility.

Some of the projects undertaken by the Department of Science and

Technology in India starting April 2006, include isolated models and
experiments for introducing methods which meet evidence methods those

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

falling under cyber-forensics, brain mapping, Court2117 technology mainly for

criminal matters. Some of the projects are now being conducted on regular
basis like in Delhi Video conferencing is used for recording the presence of
under trials every 15 days by a Judge as mandated by criminal procedure code
of 1973 (India) till the commencement of the trial.
ADR as procedural Law focus:
ADR is a mass outreach program and is like adopting pre-trial conference
prevalent in US and UK legal system in all civil matters. The amendment to
CPC in 2002, make ADR mandatory and Courts are obliged to ascertain
common facts on examination of pleadings and documents for admission and
denials therein, before the commencement of trial.
In Order X rule 1A, B and C have been added therein to first attempt the
compromise/conciliation as provided by section 89 of CPC and fix a date of
appearance and a failure to arrive at conciliation return back to court to
proceed with trial process.

Technology and ADR in Courts of knowledge society:

While the procedural law has been amended in India, there has been virtually
no reconciliation of the advantageous use of technology, including those
existing options of both ‘Level One technology’ and ‘Web-based application’
for ADR on ‘as is basis’.
It is now the Millenium experience, that technology can drastically reduce
time and save money but it has to be dynamically used. Until the costs of
hardware and software came within the reach of common man, PC penetration
was not a reality so was not the web so was not email so was not Yahoo, so
was not Google , so on and so forth.
Indian ADR effort to cut time has not used any advantage of technology. The
disposal can be quadrapuled. The number of references since last year has

17
includes digital recording,video conferencing, instant transcribing of speech to word document.
Singapore and many courts in US already use this enhanced and futuristic technology.

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

increased many folds and it is the tool which is being used by every judge to
increase their dockets.
Adding to the objectives of IT in courts and Courtnic; the standardization of
procedures and guidelines of process to be adopted, are the next steps which
need to be deliberated to avoid confusion in absence of the same..
The ADR techniques utilization for the objective, today remain as
cumbersome as Court procedures without efiling, elisting, without date
management system with the courts, etc.
While the Mediators, conciliators and arbitrators face challenge of human
interaction and their application of inter-personal skill in virtual settings, they
can certainly learn to put to use their skills in virtual settings, to eliminate the
process barriers, wherein save time and public money.
It is here that the Public private participation can be of immense value since
the innovative inputs are most needed to cut the huge case loads and variety of
them. The over burdened court system or “pure” public goods are increasingly
hampering the growth of real knowledge based society.

Justice in Palms:
Amidst the growth in ICT, mobile phones18 in India have outgrown PC and
laptop growth, the obsolence in terms of model and technology innovations
can well be seen here. SMS19 in India is a major source of revenue to such
Service providers/companies.
Many of the FMCG companies use this medium for grievance redressal and
promotion simultaneously.
ADR through courts can use this FRONT DEVICE with 3G technology on the
anvil.
Having an interactive site and model where parties can try these ADR options
without physically present or waiting for the appointed hour can meet their
agenda to work through ADR methods.

18
India has 130 Million subscribers and density is now higher than landline. Rural areas have seen the
real surge in growth.
19
short message service, average as on Oct 2007 was 34 per average user for a month.

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

A detailed study of litigant profile, who can be divided into ‘one shotters’ or
‘repeat players’ can help a lot in tailoring the available technology its ultimate
objective of delivering Justice in time. As of now litigant profiling to
strengthen the alternative dispute mechanism is not available.
There exist no study (independent or otherwise), of litigant profiling in India
with the courts.

However the new litigation in civil side are mostly ‘one shotters’, that being
so, for such profile of litigants, use of technology to cut time and meet Docket
objectives through web based application can be extremely useful in creating
a flow cycle in the disposal of matters.

Illustrations:
Providing web-based conferences for the litigants at flexible hours with entire
records available to users can be very effective. It can be facilitated for those
who do not own PC or do not have the access to the web. A guidance support
mechanism will make it work effectively.

A strong argument in favour is how a person who is an illiterate or low tech

can still use cell phone not just for voice but for SMS or MMS. An increasing
number of people use the fancy phone models as multimedia equipment and
to make home movies etc. Integrating these mobile phones access with web-
based applications can give tremendous value addition.

Other ISSUES:
The other major challenge can be identified as IT interface to facilitate eADR
being quality training of the stake holders mainly the lawyers and judges who
act as mediators. Indeed as seen in the past technology integration has been
possible but the stake holders had been found wanting and bereft of such
initiatives.
Justice system is one of the “pure” public goods which have been “under
produced” by private enterprise at some time in history, however ICT changes

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

have the potential to make it rival with Public Private Partnership model.
When the legislation permits ‘out of court’ settlement, which by itself calls for
private participation for optimal utilization and ensuing benfits for the target
benefactors.

eADR and Consumer movement:

The next utilization of “pure” public goods in India can be to
strengthen the consumer awakening and their rights by bringing the eADR
methods to the millions of homes and about 350 middle class who spends
50% of their income on buying consumer durables and other consumables.

Existing model:
The mode to redress complaints in most Retail Finance and banking
companies is mandated by law to have an internal ombudsman and complete
three-step grievance redressal, online system.
In an online grievance settlement mechanism typically would have
complaint officer, on escalation of complaint; is redressal officer, and finally
the Ombudsman.

eADR an extension of online grievance system, will have tremendous

advantage in terms of small claims dispute settlement. Earbitration.net20 is the
first online dispute resolution Indian portal which is being preferred by some
of the consumer organizations and other utility organizations to settle small
claims online.

The reality is that more than 2 million cases fall under this category
are pending all over India when the statute called Consumer Protection Act, in
1986 was enacted to do away with court fees and a simple application with
disposal time of ninety days. An average case in consumer court lasts for two
minimum years if not appealed by either contesting party.

20
www.earbitration.net

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
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By Syed Kamran Razvi

CONCLUSION:
eADR presents timely disposal of disputes without going through the
long drawn adversarial process which often results in appeals and second
appeals to different courts.
eADR techniques can lead a new dimension to pure public goods in
many years to come. It can enable huge cuts in case loads on Justice system
whereby making it easy for Judges, staff, lawyers and citizens to have well
managed Justice System. Its ingenuity and simplicity imbibes the age old
tradition of Panchayat,21 and like all ICT initiatives is likely to usher a new
term and societal benefits called eJustice.
------------------------------

21
Panchayat translates as gathering of five wise men to resolve disputes such was the traditional
dispute resolution in over half a million in Indian villages since ancient times. An age old system in
India is now mandated by constitutional provisions Art.243A to ZG, with inbuilt elements of Justice as
envisaged in modern times.

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

Appendix A: Heirarchy of courts in India

SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

Sit in Division Benches( at least two Judges)

HIGH COURTS OF STATES SOME TRIBUNALS

(Appellate, Extraordinary, Ordinary Designated courts, Regulatory

original, Company Jurisdiction authorities/Commissions, etc.
exercisable in the territorial limits of
the State.)

1. Some times two or more States

has common High Court or Benches
in various parts of a State.

2.They sit in Single and Division

Benches

3.They are the inspecting judges on

District Judges

Criminal Courts Civil Courts

Session Judge Court (Offences District Judges Court

punishable by more than three (Appellate and original Trial of
years barring exception), Suits pecuniary jurisdiction, Family
Designated Courts. Courts, etc)

Metropolitan magistrates/Judicial
Magistrates/Executive Civil Judge Court/Small Causes
Magistrates/Revenue Magistrate Court
Courts(exercising preventive law
on reference from local police)

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 ‘Advancing IT application in Indian Courts and eADR:
Challenge to meet ‘Justice in Palms’.
By Syed Kamran Razvi

END NOTES:

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i
See Appendix A to paper
ii
Section 89 of CPC: “ settlement of disputes outside the courts-(1) Where it appears to the court that there
exist element of a settlement which may be acceptable to the parties, the court shall formulate the terms of
settlement and give them to the parties for their observations and after receiving the observations of the
parties, the court may reformulate the terms of a possible settlement and refer the same for-(a) arbitration; (b)
conciliations; (c) judicial settlement including settlement through Lok Adalat; or (d) mediation.
(2)……(d) for mediation, the court shall effect a compromise between the parties and shall follow such
procedures as may be prescribed”.

Order V Rule 9 of CPC states: Delivery of summons to the plaintiff or his agent (1) The court shall issue
summons and deliver the same to the plaintiff of his agent, for service, and direct the summons to be served
by registered post acknowledgement due or by speed post or by such courier service as may be approved by
the High Court or by fax message or by Electronic mail service or by such other means as the High Court …
……

iii
inexpensive determination of every action.” (Rule 1, Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.) the United States
Congress enacted the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990, requiring each United States District court, working
with planning groups of attorneys, to develop and implement a “civil justice expense and delay reduction
plan.” The legislation instructed each court to formulate a case management program providing for “early
and ongoing control of the pretrial process through involvement of a judicial officer” whose responsibilities
include “assessing and planning the progress of a case” and “setting early, firm trial dates.” The Alternative
Dispute Resolution Act of 1998 was the final related piece of legislation. That Act mandated every U.S.
District Court to offer some type of court-annexed ADR process.

The practice of judicial case management has spread to most state courts. Today, trial judges throughout the
United States are actively managing civil cases from filing through disposition with a purpose of achieving
the “just, speedy….”: http://www.isdls.com/authoritative_papers_smith.html

Spangler, Brad. "Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR)." Beyond Intractability. Eds. Guy Burgess and
iv

Heidi Burgess. Conflict Research Consortium, University of Colorado, Boulder. Posted: June 2003
v
www.causlists.nic.in ; www.delhidistrictcourts.nic.in; www.delhihighcourt.nic.in

LIST OF REFERENCES:

1. Cases and Materials on the English Legal System; Michael Zander; Butterworths;1993
2. ECOMMERCE LAW; John W.Bagby; Thomson ;
3. Corporate Governance; Robert A.G.Monks and Nell Minow; Blackwell;2004
4. Civil Procedure Code of 1908 (as amended) Universal (India); 2008
5. Law relating to Computers, internet and E-commerce, Nandan Kamath, Universal, 2000

LIST OF STATUTES:
1. Uniform Electronic Transaction Act, 1999;
2. Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act, (federal E-sign),2000;
3. Information Technology Act, (India)2000;
4. Section 89, CPC of 1908 (India), 2002 amendment and Order V rule 9;
5. Legal Services Authority Act,1987 (India );
6. Constitution of India, 1950.
7. Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (India)
8. Indian Evidence Act, 1882