Efforts underway to expedite more than 1.1 million pending court cases

Efforts are continuing to expedite the clearing of more than 1.1 million cases pending in courts, a senior government source said. 

The still pending court cases include both criminal and civil cases. Some cases have been pending for nearly 20 years. 

The source noted that the recent decision by Chief Justice Preethi Padman Surasena to assign a number of High Courts in Colombo to hear separate subjects is part of efforts to expedite hearing of pending cases. 

The Sunday Times earlier reported that fifteen High Courts in Colombo are expected to be assigned to hear cases of separate subjects under a revised system introduced to expedite cases on the directions of the Chief Justice. 

According to the Chief Justice’s instructions to the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), one High Court will be exclusively hearing bribery and corruption cases. 

The government source said the JSC may even add a second High Court to hear bribery and corruption cases later on. He also pushed back against accusations by some in the opposition that the recent transfer of High Court judges had not followed their level of seniority. The source pointed out that the transfers are conducted by the JSC and as far as he could gather, they were indeed made after taking the judges' seniority to account.