SARVESH MATHUR versus THE REGISTRAR GENERAL HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA

Citation: [2023] 13 S.C.R. 1117 · Decided: 06-10-2023 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: D.Y. CHANDRACHUD, J.B. PARDIWALA, MANOJ MISRA · Disposal: Directions issued

Judgment (excerpt)

CASE DETAILS
SARVESH MATHUR
v.
THE REGISTRAR GENERAL HIGH COURT OF
PUNJAB AND HARYANA
(Writ Petition (Criminal) No. 351 of 2023)
OCTOBER 06, 2023
[DR. D.Y. CHANDRACHUD, CJI, J.B. PARDIWALA AND 
MANOJ MISRA, JJ.]
HEADNOTES
Issue for consideration: Denial of access to video conferencing 
facilities or hearing through the hybrid mode.
Directions by Supreme Court – Conduction of hearings through 
video conferencing/hybrid mode – Considerable variation between High 
Courts in the level of adoption of technology – Position of the tribunals 
under various ministries of the Union Government:
Held: No High Court shall deny access to video conferencing facilities 
or hearing through the hybrid mode to any member of the Bar or litigant 
desirous of availing of such a facility – All State Governments shall provide 
necessary funds to the High Courts to put into place the facilities requisite for 
that purpose within the time frame as indicated – High Courts shall ensure 
that adequate internet facilities, including Wi-Fi facilities, with suffi  cient 
bandwidth are made available free of charge to all advocates and litigants 
appearing before the High Courts within the precincts of the High Court 
complex – The links available for accessing video conferencing/hybrid 
hearings shall be made available in the daily cause-list of each court and 
there shall be no requirement of making prior applications – No High Court 
shall impose an age requirement or any other arbitrary criteria for availing 
of virtual/hybrid hearings – All the High Courts shall put into place an 
SOP within a period of four weeks for availing of access to hybrid/video 
conference hearings, directions issued for its eff ectuation – High Courts shall 
place on the record the details as directed – Union Ministry of Electronics 
[2023] 13 S.C.R. 1117 : 2023 INSC 891
1117
1118 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
[2023] 13 S.C.R.
& Information Technology to coordinate with the Department of Justice 
to ensure that adequate bandwidth and internet connectivity is provided 
to all the courts in the North-East and in Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh 
and Jammu and Kashmir to facilitate access to online hearings – High 
Courts shall ensure that adequate training facilities are made available to 
the members of the Bar and Bench – Union of India shall ensure that on or 
before 15.11.2023, all tribunals are provided with requisite infrastructure 
for hybrid hearings – All Tribunals shall ensure the commencement of 
hybrid hearings no later than the said date – Directions governing the High 
Courts shall also apply to the Tribunals functioning under all the Ministries 
of the Union Government including CESTAT, ITAT, NCLAT, NCLT, AFT, 
NCDRC, NGT, SAT, CAT, DRATs and DRTs – Additional Solicitor General 
shall immediately contact the Chairperson of the APTEL and take necessary 
steps on behalf of the Union of India to ensure that video conferencing/
hybrid facilities are made available at APTEL within a period of one month 
from the date of this order. [Paras 14, 15]
OTHER CASE DETAILS INCLUDING IMPUGNED 
ORDER AND APPEARANCES
CRIMINAL ORIGINAL JURISDICTION: Writ Petition (Criminal) 
No. 351 of 2023.
Under Article 32 of The Constitution of India
Appearances:
Petitioner-in-person
K M Nataraj, A.S.G., Nidhesh Gupta, Guru Krishna Kumar, Virender 
Ganda, Sr. Advs., Arvind Kumar Sharma, Sharath Nambiar, Chitransh 
Sharma, Shashwat Anand, Amrish Kumar,   Abhimanyu Tewari, Ms. Eliza 
Bar, Tushar Bathija,  Siddhant Saroha,  Sidhant Awasthy,  Praveer Singh, 
Parth Jain, Kunal Chatterji, Ms. Maitrayee Banerjee, Rohit Bansal, Ms. 
Kshitij Singh,  Varinder Kumar Sharma,  Nikhil Goel,  P. I. Jose,  James 
P. Thomas,  Ravi Sagar,  Gaurav Agrawal,  Gautam Narayan, Ms. Asmita 
Singh, Harshit Goel, Siddhant Singh, Sahil Tagotra, Shibashish Misra, 
Tapesh Kumar Singh, Aditya Pratap Singh, Deepayan Mandal, Naman 
Varma, Mridul Bansal,  K. Parameshwar, Ms. Arti Gupta, Ms. Kanti, 
Chinmay Kalgaonkar,  T. G. Narayanan Nair, Ms. Swathi H. Prasad, Rituraj 
1119
SARVESH MATHUR v. THE REGISTRAR GENERAL 
HIGH COURT OFPUNJAB AND HARYANA
Biswas, P. D. Gupta, Ms. Sujaya Bardhan, Mukul Kumar, Sandeep Sudhakar 
Deshmukh, Nishant Sharma, Tushar D. Bhelkar, Akshay Subhash Jagtap, 
Swapnil Anil Walde, Sanjai Kumar Pathak, Arvind Kumar Tripathi, Mrs. 
Shashi Pathak, Apoorv Kurup, Shivansh Dwivedi, Ms. Kirti Dadheech, 
Ms. Aparna Arun, Ms. Gauri Goburdhun, Akhil Hasija, Himanshu Shekhar, 
Parth Shekhar, Ms. Ambali Vedasen, Shubha

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