Supreme Court Website

November 14, 2016

In 2016, CLPR is setting up a website to track the working of the Supreme Court of India. This website will be a non-partisan journalistic effort to make the work of the Court intelligible to any person interested in Indian public affairs.

 

The aim of the website is to communicate the relevance and importance of the Supreme Court’s work in a constitutional democracy without embellishment or outrage and focus public attention on the issues of great public significance. Emphasis will be given to accessibility and simplicity in presentation in order to ensure maximum public engagement.

 

The inspiration for this website is taken from the SCOTUSBlog in the USA which provides similar coverage for all the cases before the Supreme Court of the United States of America. PRS Legislative Research provides a similar service and resource database for the bills before the Indian Parliament.

 

The website will provide the following information:

 

  1. Case tracker:

 

The Website will track certain high impact cases from inception to completion before the Court. The primary criterion for the selection of cases will be their potential to affect ordinary lives.

 

All tracked cases will contain the following:

  1. A calendar tracking the day-to-day progress of the case
  2. Copies of all important documents associated with the case including but not limited to pleadings, a summary of arguments and judgments.
  3. A plain English explanation of the issues involved and the potential impact of the case.

 

  1. Court Statistics:

 

The website will provide statistical information on the work of the Supreme Court on a term by term basis in a manner that may be understood by all citizens. The purpose of this section is to give the reader an overall sense of the work that the Supreme Court does on a quarterly basis.

 

We propose to include all:

  1. Admissions cases based on the numbers released by the Supreme Court in its quarterly reports
  2. Judicial decision making. All decided cases will be analysed on the basis of various factors including bench size, subject and pendency.

 

The Harvard Law Review and the SCOTUSBlog provide similar statistics packs for the US Supreme Court.

 

The website will display these statistics through graphs and charts. Users would be able to generate their own charts by selecting their preferred parameters. The website would emulate the example of Pew Research and Indiaspend for representing these data.

 

  1. Accessibility and Outreach

 

To improve accessibility, the website would provide plain English descriptions of:

  1. The types of jurisdiction of the Court.
  2. The procedure of the Court.
  3. A glossary of legal terms used.
  4. Flow charts detailing the progress of cases before the Court.