The Tribunals story - empty, aimless and adrift

The Tribunals in India are in an urgent need of an overhaul, to restore the process of justice delivery in many techniocal matters.

 The Tribunals story - empty, aimless and adrift

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• The story: In August '21, the Supreme Court (SC) expressed displeasure against the Central government by asking whether it intends to “close” tribunals by not filling up vacancies that have been pending for years. Tribunals are quasi-judicial institutiona set up to deal with problems such as resolving administrative or tax-related disputes.
• What are Tribunals: When the workload on courts rises substantially, to speed things up, government sets up Tribunals. These are quasi-judicial institutions, that perform many functions like (i) adjudicating disputes, (ii) determining rights between contesting parties, (iii) making an administrative decision, (iv) reviewing an existing administrative decision etc.
• Novelty: Tribunals were not part of the original constitution, but incorporated in the Indian Constitution by 42nd Amendment Act, 1976.

1. Article 323-A deals with Administrative Tribunals. Article 323-B deals with tribunals for other matters.
2. Tribunals were set up to reduce the workload of courts, to expedite decisions and to provide a forum which would be manned by lawyers and experts in the areas falling under the jurisdiction of the Tribunal.

• Many issues: The SC noted that vacancies of 20 presiding officers, 110 judicial members and 111 technical members were pending across India in various tribunals, severely hampering their work. In the National Green Tribunal (NGT), Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT), Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), many vacancies existed.

1. Ignoring recommendations - Names sent by the selection committees led by sitting Supreme Court judges to fill up the vacancies have been largely ignored by the government.
2. Acess to justice hampered - The Supreme Court pointed out that with tribunals defunct and High Courts having no jurisdiction over the areas of law wielded by tribunals, litigants have nowhere to go for justice and are stuck in a hopeless quagmire.
3. Non-Uniformity - Added to these is the problem of non-uniformity across tribunals with respect to service conditions, tenure of members, varying nodal ministries in charge of different tribunals. These contribute to malfunctioning in the managing and administration of tribunals.

• New laws: Meanwhile, the Tribunals Reforms (Rationalisation and Conditions of Service) Bill, 2021 was introduced in the Lok Sabha. It dissolves certain existing appellate bodies and transfers their functions to other existing judicial bodies. The term of office for the Chairperson and members of a Tribunals will be four years, subject to an upper age limit of seventy years for the Chairperson, and sixty-seven years for other members. It specifies that a person should be at least 50 years of age to be eligible for appointment as a Chairperson or member.
• Summary: Reforming the tribunals system in India may as well be one of the keys to remedy the age-old problem that still cripples the Indian judicial system – the problem of judicial delay and backlog. To regulate the matters of tribunals without compromising their independence is the establishment of the National Tribunals Commission (NTC).

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