Over five crores cases lie pending in courts, from the Supreme Court to district tribunals. Trials stretch for years, sometimes decades. For the common citizen, this is a story of denied justice, writes former IAS officer V S Pandey.
History has one clear lesson for countries aspiring to grow fast- robust judicial system is must for prosperity and faster economic growth. But unfortunately India’s judiciary has remained poorly managed and in crisis for several decades now. Over five crore cases lie
pending in courts, from the Supreme Court to district tribunals. Trials stretch for years, sometimes decades. For the common citizen, this is a story of denied justice. For the economy, it is a story of denied growth.
Multiple studies estimate that judicial delays cost India between 1 and 2 per cent of GDP annually — roughly $40–80 billion (₹3–6 lakh crore) in today’s terms. That is money locked in disputed contracts, stalled projects, contested tax demands, and endless litigation. It is growth that never happens, jobs that are never created, and investments that never materialise.
Yet, when politicians speak of “ease of doing business”, judicial reform rarely features as a centrepiece. The 2025 India Justice Report (IJR) paints a grim picture: vacancy rates of 33 per cent in High Courts and 21 per cent in district courts, budget allocations that barely touch 1 per cent of state budgets, and a judge–population ratio of just 15–21 per million, far below the Law Commission’s recommended 50 per million.
The question is no longer whether the system is broken. It is why we continue to tolerate a broken system that is actively hampering India’s economic ambitions.
The price of pendency
The economic cost of judicial delay is not abstract. It shows up in concrete ways:
• Contract enforcement takes years. A commercial dispute that should be resolved in months drags on for five to ten years. Capital remains tied up, cash flows are disrupted, and businesses hesitate to expand or invest.
• Stalled infrastructure and industrial projects. Land acquisition disputes, environmental clearances, and tax litigation often end up in court. Projects worth thousands of crores remain stuck because title disputes or regulatory challenges are not decided in time.
• Tax uncertainty. The government itself is among the largest litigants, routinely appealing tax decisions even in borderline cases. This creates uncertainty for businesses, discourages compliance, and locks up revenues in prolonged litigation.
• Lost productivity. Litigants, witnesses, lawyers, and even judges spend countless hours on repeated adjournments and procedural hearings that yield little progress. One study estimated the annual cost of lost working hours and litigant expenses at over ₹1 lakh crore, about 0.55 per cent of GDP.
When you add these up, the “invisible tax” of judicial delay becomes one of the biggest drags on India’s growth potential.
Procedure over justice
India’s procedural laws were designed for a different era. The Civil Procedure Code, Criminal Procedure Code (now partly replaced by the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita), and the Evidence Act are riddled with layers of appeals, interlocutory applications, and technical requirements that prioritise form over substance.
In practice, this means:
• Frequent adjournments are granted as a matter of course, often as a tactic to delay.
• Cases are listed for a few minutes each, making continuous trials impossible.
• The same dispute is litigated repeatedly across forums, from trial courts to tribunals to constitutional benches.
There are no uniform national standards for how long a case “should” take. Case management is weak. As a result, even straightforward matters stretch into marathons.
Underfunded and under-equipped
India spends shockingly little on its justice system. Total expenditure on the judiciary is around ₹182 per person per year, with no state allocating even 1 per cent of its budget to courts. Most of this goes to salaries, not to new posts, infrastructure, technology, or training.
Court buildings lack basic facilities — courtrooms, record rooms, even toilets. Support staff — court managers, stenographers, process servers — are inadequate, forcing judges to spend time on administrative tasks.
Digitisation under the e‑Courts project has improved filing and tracking, but implementation is. Many courts still rely on physical files, manual cause lists, and outdated record-keeping.
The government as a serial litigant
A significant portion of court time is consumed by cases where the government is a party — tax disputes, land acquisition, service matters, and challenges to policies. Governments often appeal routinely, even in weak cases, because there is little internal accountability for litigation costs or outcomes.
This not only clogs courts but also signals to investors that policy disputes will be fought in court for years, not resolved through negotiation or arbitration. It undermines the credibility of contracts and the predictability of regulation.
The growth penalty
The link between judicial efficiency and economic performance is well established. Districts with higher pendency tend to have lower GDP per capita, weaker asset ownership, and lower employment. Countries that enforce contracts faster attract more investment and grow quicker.
In India, the cost of delay is not just in lost output. It is in foregone investment. Entrepreneurs think twice before entering sectors known for litigation — real estate, infrastructure, banking. Banks hesitate to lend against collateral that may take a decade to recover through courts. Startups avoid complex regulatory spaces where disputes can cripple them.
Judicial delay is, in effect, a regressive tax: it hits small businesses and poor litigants hardest, while large players can afford to wait or game the system.
A choice for India
India wants to be a $5-trillion economy, a global manufacturing hub, a trusted destination for investment. But no economy can thrive when contracts are unenforceable, disputes linger for decades, and the rule of law is slow and uncertain.
The India Justice Report 2025 is not just an audit of courts, police, and prisons. It is an audit of India’s growth model. If we continue to ignore the judiciary’s collapse, we are choosing slower growth, fewer jobs, and a more unequal society.
Justice delayed is not just justice denied. In India today, it is prosperity denied. The question is whether our political leadership has the courage to treat judicial reform not as a legal technicality, but as an economic imperative.
(Vijay Shankar Pandey is former Secretary Government of India)
