How to reform Judiciary overnight?

According to one of the documentaries of BBC India a its current speed would take 324 years to clear the cases already pending in Indian courts and that too if there is no other case registered in the meanwhile!!

We need to agree that Indian judicial system is in shambles and something needs to be done at the earliest. Judiciary in one of the pillars on which democracy functions and without it democracy is only in the name. Few days back Supreme Court gave the verdict in Bofors case, dismissing charges against the Hindujas. More than a decade old case relating to 64 crore arms deal costed Indian government 250 crores!!! Not considered all indirect expenses, leave away the cost to defendants etc.

Judiciary system has become a joke and the unwritten rule in India is - you are innocent until find guilty and the best way to defend oneself in Indian judiciary system is delay judgment. In Sunny Doel's words...tarik, tarik, tarik.

Here I suggest a very simple cure to the problem. The solution is not only of far reaching effect but surprisingly it’s also very simple and easy to implement and there is no problem of political impracticability.

According to Indian laws professions are not allowed to charge fees for their services in form of percentage of the result achieved. i.e. a lawyer can only take a contract amount as fees but not a cut in the final relief or compensation grated by the court. In developed countries it’s a normal practice for the lawyer to contract for a certain percentage of compensation as fees. In such case generally all the expenses are borne by the lawyer and his remuneration is directly dependent on the outcome of the case. In such conditions it’s in the interest of the lawyers to not only get the best result for the client but also at the earliest possible.

However, in our socialist country this has been banned and professionals are allowed to contract for only a fixed amount as fees and not a share in the outcome of the case. The logic behind such a regulation is - it would help professionals maintain high standards in practice (sic). Otherwise profession would become like any other business and there would be no ethics left in practice.

The time has come that India change this rule and allow professional to contract for share in the outcome of the service. This would not only help poor people who can ill afford the legal service to hire good lawyers (against higher share of outcome going to the lawyers) but it would also lead to quick settlement of the cases. Once sharing of the outcome is allowed it would be in the interest of the lawyers to get the judgment as early as possible. The cost of delay in judgment would pass from the parties to the case to lawyers of the case.

One argument maybe that lawyers even when given an option may not opt for percentage share mechanism and may force clients to pay fixed sum. Market forces will take care of this. Clients would opt for lawyers who are ready to bet their remuneration on their performance. Hence more and more lawyers would have to shift to this mechanism.

Another advantage would be the ‘fear factor’, which is really what judiciary system really aims to instill in a society. Currently due to dismal state of affairs of the Indian judiciary system very few fear the system and know that if caught they would either manage to get a positive decision or at least indefinitely delay the judgment. The fear factor in the society is missing and this is leading to increasing crime and corruption rate. But once this law is there, people will know that there are lawyers willing to take up case against them, bear all expenses in return of a cut in the final outcome. An aggrieved would we willing to approach the judicial system because they know they have nothing to loose. Until unless favorable judgment is received they would not be required to meet any expense, as that would be meet by the law firm. And considering the unemployment among lawyers in the country there would be many takers for cases of such poor people who can’t afford the expenses of approaching the judiciary.

And I don’t foresee any political or other practical problem in changing the above-mentioned law. Maybe lawyer organizations may oppose it in the beginning, but then there would be a section of lawyers who would be pro such change. All the government need to do is to present it properly in front of the media to create positive media support in favor of the change.

Our finance minister is also a lawyer. I think he would buy the idea. Sir, what do you think of the idea?