NEW DELHI: Chief Justice of India, DY Chandrachud, has taken a significant step to streamline the judicial process by addressing the long-standing issue of pagination discrepancies in e-filed documents. This initiative, announced Today(January 22, 2024), aims to resolve the challenges faced by the bench and advocates due to mismatched page numbers in the soft copies of case documents.
The Chief Justice highlighted the frequent occurrence of this issue, noting,
“I have always found that members of the bar and the bench aren’t on the same page with regards to the paginated soft copies of PDFs.”
This discrepancy often leads to difficulties during hearings, as the bench struggles to follow along with the page references made by the advocates.
To tackle this problem, the Chief Justice has introduced a pilot measure in his court. Under this new system, scanned copies of paper books with accurate pagination will be emailed to the Advocates on Record (AORs). These paper books will be divided into three distinct PDFs: the main PDF containing petitions and initial documents, an Additional Documents PDF for interim applications and later submissions, and a Records PDF to keep track of proceedings and office reports.
Furthermore, the Chief Justice emphasized the importance of standardizing bookmarking in these documents. Each case’s number and diary number will be sent to the respective advocates in zip folders. AORs are then responsible for sharing these documents with Senior Counsels, if involved in the case.
This initiative builds upon a previous circular issued by the Supreme Court on August 22, 2024. The circular provided comprehensive guidelines to streamline the filing of written submissions and compilations, particularly for constitution benches and other significant final hearing matters. As part of the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), it included specific instructions on pagination and PDF bookmarking, mandating that the running pages and PDF pages must coincide and that the PDFs must be bookmarked.
These measures by Chief Justice Chandrachud represent a crucial step towards enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of judicial proceedings. By ensuring consistency in document pagination and organization, the Supreme Court aims to facilitate smoother hearings and reduce the time spent on administrative discrepancies, ultimately contributing to a more streamlined and effective judicial process.
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