By OUR STAFF REPORTER
DEHRADUN, 30 Apr: Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami participated in a joint conference of Chief Ministers and Chief Justices of High Courts, held under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi. Speaking on the occasion, CM Dhami informed the gathering about the work done in the legal field in Uttarakhand. He said that while reviewing the cadre of legal officers in the last five years, Uttarakhand has increased the number of sanctioned posts from 230 to 299 and at present 271 judges are working against the total sanctioned strength of 299. Similarly, Uttarakhand has completed 5 new projects in the last years regarding construction of district courts etc, while the pending cases of more than 3 years period have been dealt with. Dhami said that Uttarakhand has prepared its five year plan in respect of annual infrastructure requirements in collaboration with the High Court, and it has been submitted to the Union Government under the Centrally Funded Scheme (CSS). An amount of Rs 80 crore has already been allocated by the Union Government to the state of Uttarakhand for this financial year. Similarly, in respect of the Nainital High Court, Information Technology (IT) facilities are being expanded. Presently 26 technical officers are working against one sanctioned post of technical officer. It was also informed that 13 member secretaries have been appointed in the District Legal Services Authority in all the 13 districts, one each in every district. Along with this, special juvenile police units have been established in all the 13 districts. Regarding the facility given by Uttarakhand to the retired High Court judges, the rules had been notified in the month of December 2021. Two commercial courts had been started in the state by Uttarakhand and soon the operation of National Law University would also begin. For the first time in the country, the facility of 13 mobile court vans have been started in 13 districts of Uttarakhand to record the testimony of old, sick and those persons who are unable to come to court for some valid reasons and therefore the testimony was also being recorded through video conferencing.
