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District and Sessions Judge Dharmesh Sharna of Tis Hazari Court issued strict directions to hear urgent matters and bail applications via digital medium of Video Conferencing.
The directions will be operational from 18/4/2020 until further orders, these directions are as follows:
- In order to avail the facility of videoconferencing for hearing of urgent applications, the Litigant/Lawyer may file an application for bail/other applications at the official-mail ID [email protected] The application be sent with all the relevant details of the FIR No., offences and the Police station concerned, accompanied with a scanned copy of the vakalatnama or authority letter of the spouse or parent or family member of the applicant/accused. It must contain the name of the advocate in full, Bar Enrollment no., his contact number and email address All the accompanying documents must be in PDF format, duly paginated and bookmarked.
- The mails shall be checked on a regular basis by Ms Tripta Diwan, Sr. Administrative Officer, Judicial along with any other official from the judicial branch, as soon as any bail application or any other misc. application and/or reply is received on mail, the Sr. AOJ shall inform about receipt of such mail to the Officer In-charge at the Facilitation Centre Counter, who shall then take a print out of the bail application and register it as per rules, and the hard copy shall be placed before the Court concerned for consideration, notice to the Chief Public Prosecutor and the reply from the Investigating office through their respective email addresses.
- The Officer In-charge shall intimate the Computer Branch immediately regarding the filing of the bail application as well as its registration number. Shri Kuldeep from the Computer Branch shall be the Nodal Officer who shall also keep a record of the bail application filed through email (8750872266 and email address: [email protected])
- Shri Kuldeep, Nodal Officer, Computer Branch shall thereafter immediately forward the bail application along with the e-mail sent by the Lawyer/Litigant to the Nodal Officer appointed by the DCP concerned at the DCP Office with a direction to seek a reply of the same from the IO of the concerned police station and send the reply to the Nodal Officer, Computer Branch as soon as possible.
- Where the bail application is filed on a given day before 2:00 p.m, the reply of the same shall be called for the following working day, that shall be submitted by 10 am by e-mail to [email protected] : and where the bail application is filed after 2.00 p.m, then the reply shall be called for the working day subsequent/next to the following day. As soon as a reply is received on the official email [email protected], the Sr. AOJ shall inform and forward the reply on email to the Nodal Officer.
- On being informed and forwarded with the reply, Shri Kuldeep Nodal Officer, Computer Branch after receiving the reply to the bail application shall immediately forward it to the Litigant/Lawyer concerned as well as the Public Prosecutor on duty for the day, copy of the same shall also be sent to the Prosecution Branch. In the said email, the Litigant/Lawyer as well as the Public Prosecutor concerned may be given an option to either send their arguments, not exceeding one A-4 size page, via email only, or to state if they wish to address arguments through CISCO WEBEX. Provided that the hearing through video conferencing shall be conducted during working hours from 10 am till 5 pm as per the time slots in the discretion of the Court concerned.
- In case written arguments are received from both the sides, then in such a scenario, the Nodal Officer, Computer Branch shall send the bail application, reply thereof received from IO and the written arguments of the defence and the Public Prosecutor to the concerned Court, who shall decide the bail application and shall send his digitally signed order via email to the Nodal Officer, Computer Branch.
- In case the Litigant/Lawyer intends to address arguments then in consultation with the Court concerned, date and time of hearing shall be fixed and the same shall be communicated through an e-mail by the Nodal Officer, Computer Branch to the Litigant/Lawyer and to the concerned Public Prosecutor on duty for the said date.
- On the date and time fixed, the Nodal Officer, Computer Branch shall make necessary arrangements for video conferencing and shall bring the Court, lawyer and the Prosecutor on one platform through CISCO WEBEX after which the hearing shall be conducted. The Court concerned may also use its own official laptop or the desktop on the dais attached with a web-cam, if provided by the Computer Branch, for the purposes of holding a hearing through video conferencing.
- After receiving the order on bail from the Court concerned, the Nodal Officer, Computer Branch shall forward the same to the Litigant/Lawyer concerned. A copy of the same, in case the bail is granted, shall be sent to the Jail Superintendent concerned on his official email [email protected] for reference in case where the bail bonds are furnished directly before the Magistrate concerned discharging duties through jail sittings.
- The Reader or the Ahlmad of the Court on duty, or any other official of the Court concerned, in the discretion of the Ld. Judge concerned, shall be the overall co-ordinator to facilitate hearing through video conferencing.
- In determining whether a matter is ‘urgent’, the ld Court shall have regard to, among other factors, whether the decision on the application is “time sensitive” or that there are ground for a determination within a specified time frame. This is only an interim arrangement till such time any guidelines are framed by the Hon’ble High Court of Delhi.
