Ex-Attorney General, Mukul Rohatgi: ‘Virtual hearings must continue even after the reopening of Courts’

Welcoming the temporary shift to virtual hearings, Ex-Attorney General of India, Mukul Rohatgi, said they should be mixed with the physical functioning of courts after reopening.

Since the lockdown, there has been no more rushing to Courts, jostling with lawyers and wearing gowns.

The former Attorney General said that “In a matter of two months, all that seems to be in the distant past".

He said, “This system must remain even if we bring the physical system back... Maybe reserve one day for hearings conducted through video conferencing.”

Sharing his experience of appearing in court remotely, the Ex-Attorney General said virtual hearings have a number of benefits. “Judges are sitting in homes, may not have access to all law books. One has to be to the point. This is a better, cheaper and more integrated system, it is also good for the environment.”

Mr Rohtagi added that lawyers from mofussil towns can appear in Court from remote locations.

He said, “Litigation has become cheaper because lawyers need not travel".

Drawing a comparison to the lockdown resulting in a cleaner Ganga, Rohatgi said a similar cleanup of the judicial system could follow.

He said that “What 15 years of Govt intervention couldn’t do, the lockdown has done: Ganga has healed itself. Similarly, what 10 years of connecting courts by e-system, by different committees and paperwork couldn’t do, has been done in eight weeks because necessity is the mother of invention".

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