As India Sees Rise In Covid-19 Cases, CJI Allows Advocates To WFH

New Delhi: Amid a rising number of Covid-19 cases in India, Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud on Wednesday said that the Supreme Court is willing to hear lawyers via video conferencing. Referring to recent media reports, a bench comprising the CJI and Justice JB Pardiwala said the court is more than willing to permit lawyers to appear through the hybrid mode.

India on Wednesday recorded 4,435 new Covid-19 infections, the biggest single-day jump in 163 days. 

"We can hear you through video conferencing mode also," CJI Chandrachud said.

It is notable that the top court has been successfully experimenting with the hybrid method -- a combination of physical and virtual -- of hearing for quite some time now.

Earlier last year, it had reverted to virtual hearings due to a spike in coronavirus cases. 

All physical hearings were suspended for two weeks in January 2022, following growing concerns over the surge driven by the Omicron variant.

The apex court had also held virtual hearings in 2020 during the Covid-19 outbreak. 

The SC has also started live-streaming the Constitution bench proceedings through the Supreme Court app and YouTube even after the resumption of physical hearings.

Virtual court hearings in India due to Covid-19 outbreak

Since the Covid-19 induced lockdown started, the District Courts in India had heard as many as 1,23,19,917 cases while the High Courts heard 61,02,859 cases till February 28, 2022, using video conferencing.

The Supreme Court had also held 2,18,891 hearings till March 14, 2022 since the beginning of the lockdown period, making it the world leader in virtual hearings.

To bring about uniformity and standardization in the conduct of VC, an overarching order was passed by the Supreme Court on April 6, 2020, which gave legal sanctity and validity to the court hearings done through VC.

Further, VC rules were framed by a 5-judge committee which was circulated to all the High Courts for adoption after local contextualization.

Since then, more than 24 High Courts have implemented Video Conferencing rules.

India reports 4,435 new Covid-19, highest single-day rise in 163 days

India on Wednesday reported 4,435 new Covid-19 cases, the biggest single-day jump in 163 days. With this, the number of active cases in the country increased to 23,091, according to Union health ministry data updated at 8 am.

India's Covid-19 tally currently stands at 4,47,33,719, while the death toll increased to 5,30,916 with 15 fresh fatalities.

Four deaths were reported from Maharashtra; one death each was reported from Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Gujarat, Haryana, Karnataka, Puducherry, and Rajasthan; and four were reconciled by Kerala.

The number of people who have recuperated from the disease surged to 4,41,79,712, while the case fatality rate stood at 1.19 per cent.

At 23,091, the country's active caseload now comprises 0.05 per cent of the total infections, while the national Covid-19 recovery rate stands at 98.76 per cent.

The daily positivity rate was recorded at 3.38 per cent and the weekly positivity rate at 2.79 per cent.