Recently, Punjab & Haryana High Court Chief Justice Vijender Kumar Jain had issued a notification to all HC judges to take up pending cases pertaining to senior citizens, NRIs, widows and ex-servicemen on a priority basis.

While Allahabad tops the list with a whopping 8,08,226 pending cases, Madras and Bombay stand second and third with 4,26,347 and 3,67,409 pending cases respectively. Calcutta stands fourth in the list with f 2,79,318 pending cases. Sikkim has the least number of pending cases at 67.

The information was given by Minister of Law and Justice, H R Bhardwaj, in reply to a question in Rajya Sabha. As many as 46,926 cases were pending in the Supreme Court on December 31, 2007.

In the 21 High Courts across the country, More than 37 lakh cases were pending on September 30, 2007. Of these, around 30 lakh were civil cases and the rest were criminal.

Bhardwaj has further submitted that the government has taken several steps, including increasing the strength of judges in High Courts and the Supreme Court, setting up of fast-track courts, special tribunals like the Central Administrative Tribunal, Income Tax Appellate Tribunals to facilitate disposal of cases in courts.