Delhi High Court
Anjana Gosain vs Government Of Nct And Anr. on 7 April, 2022
Signature Not Verified
Digitally Signed By:Devanshu
Signing Date:09.04.2022
15:24:47
$~2 (SB)
* IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI
Date of decision: 7th April, 2022
+ W.P.(C) 2506/2019 & CM APPL.19643/2021
ANJANA GOSAIN ..... Petitioner
Through: Ms. Shalini Nair, Advocate.
versus
GOVERNMENT OF NCT AND ANR. ..... Respondents
Through: Mr. Sameer Vashisht, ASC, GNCTD.
CORAM:
JUSTICE PRATHIBA M. SINGH
Prathiba M. Singh, J. (Oral)
1. This hearing has been done through hybrid mode.
2. The present matter concerns the outstanding bills of the Petitioner-Ms.
Anjana Gosain, who is a lawyer, and the non-payment of the outstanding fee
by the Respondent- GNCTD.
3. At the outset of today's hearing, Ms. Anjana Gosain submits that all
her outstanding fee memos have been cleared by the Respondent-GNCTD.
4. A status report has been handed over to the Court by Mr. Sameer
Vashisht, ld. ASC in respect of the Single Window System (hereinafter
"SWS") for the payment of fee to Government counsels appearing for the
GNCTD. The said status report, in compliance of the order dated 17 th January,
2022, reports further progress on the finalization and launching of the SWS
for the payment of fees to Government counsels.
5. The status report reveals that the SWS for smooth and seamless
payments of Government counsels is now at an advanced stage of
Signature Not Verified
Digitally Signed By:Devanshu
Signing Date:09.04.2022
15:24:47
development. The chronology of events set out in the status report shows that
from February onwards, there has been coordination between the Law
Department, GNCTD and the National Informatics Centre (NIC) for the
setting up of SWS and for the training of the staff of various departments of
GNCTD as also Government counsels, whose bills are to be processed
through the system.
6. As of 17th March, 2022, the Virtual Machine is stated to have been
created by the National Informatics Centre Services Inc. (NICSI) Cloud
Coordinator and the URL of the link has also been provided to the Department
of Law, GNCTD for the security audit. The sub-domain that has been chosen
for hosting the SWS is http://osws.delhi.gov.in which is now under the control
of the IT Department of the GNCTD. Emergency hosting website on NIC has
been issued by the Law Department and the training of departmental officers
is stated to have been completed as of 30th March, 2022. It is stated that the
sub-domain has been put in public domain, however, it has been made
accessible only to the officers of various Departments of GNCTD as the
security audit is still underway. The relevant portion of the status report reads
as under-
"It is pertinent to mention the hosted Website will be
accessible only to various departments of GNCT of
Delhi at present for the purpose of updating the
hierarchy of the officers who are involved in
processing of fee bill of Govt. Counsels. Further, the
portal will be accessible by the Govt. counsels
through the user ID provided by this Department
after the completion of hands on training."
7. Finally, the status report informs the Court that various suggestions
have been received from the officers of various departments of GNCTD of
Signature Not Verified
Digitally Signed By:Devanshu
Signing Date:09.04.2022
15:24:47
Delhi during the training process, some of which are being considered for
being incorporated in the existing software so as to make it more user friendly.
Government counsels, who have to upload their fee memo on a daily basis are
now to be trained as to the manner in which the portal is to be used for
uploading of bills and for ascertaining the status thereof. Accordingly, the
training has been fixed for counsels for GNCTD from 25th April, 2022 to 29th
April, 2022.
8. The Court has perused the status report and is of the view that the SWS
should be made functional soon, in view of the progress that has been made
as per the status report. Thus, the features that have to be incorporated on the
basis of the suggestions that would be made by the Government counsels, as
also the training of officers yet to be undertaken, if any, shall be completed
by 15th May, 2022. Further, the security audit is directed to be completed by
30th June, 2022. An endeavour shall be made to make the SWS portal fully
functional by 15th July, 2022.
9. The GNCTD may proceed further and allot the User IDs to the various
Government counsels whose services are being utilised for by the
Government. Further, it shall be ensured that those officials in various
departments who are handling the processing and clearing of bills do so in a
fixed time frame. The process of clearing of fee memos after being uploaded
on the SWS by the counsels ought to be completed within a period of 30 days
from the date of the uploading or any reasonable time limit so that clearing of
Government counsel's memos is not postponed indefinitely.
10. The status report filed today is taken on record.
11. Let the matter be listed on 21st July, 2022 to enable the GNCTD to file
a further status report apprising the Court of the further progress made in the
Signature Not Verified
Digitally Signed By:Devanshu
Signing Date:09.04.2022
15:24:47
implementation of the SWS for clearing of Government counsel's fee memos,
in terms of directions passed today by this Court.
PRATHIBA M. SINGH
JUDGE
APRIL 7, 2022/dj/sk
