An Abstract
‘We are moving towards a time when it will be impossible for the courts to cope up with the dockets. If something is not done, the result will be a production of line of justice that none of us would want to see’
The seven hundred years old clarion call of the Magna Carta- To no one will we sell, to no one will we refuse or delay the right to justice very pertinently embodies the principle of legal aid. The institution of Lok Adalats have evolved as one of the most important modes of alternative dispute resolution. The first instance of a Lok Adalat system was in 1982, in the village of Una, in the district of Junagarh, Gujarat. Though this was in its rudiments, a fairly modern version of the Lok Adalat system that exists till date began in Chennai, in 1986. The institution has developed, since, by leaps and bounds, by the people themselves, in order to provide for equitable justice speedily at minimal cost. The crux of this mode of justice dispensation is that it is contrived to enable the common man to ventilate his grievances against other citizens or even state agencies, and successfully arrive at an amicable settlement of sorts. Morality, honesty, justice, equity and good conscience are the high and lofty ideals upon which this institution is founded. |
