In an effort to avoid physically serving notices to State and its statutory bodies during COVID-19, the High Court of Karnataka on Monday directed the State government to submit a list of all the statutory authorities and their email IDs to issue notices through e-mail in all the proceedings before the High Court.
A Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice Suraj Govindaraj issued the direction while hearing PIL petition initiated suo motu by the High Court last year to resolve technical issues faced by the courts in functioning during lockdown.
The Bench said that it will issue directions to all the statutory bodies in the State to act upon the court notices issued through emails by the court’s registry after hearing all such bodies on the matter of receiving court’s notices through e-mode.
Meanwhile, the Bench extended by three months the deadlines issued by the High Court to complete the trial and disposal of cases within specified time frame in view if the new Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) issued for the trial court barring entry of litigants and witnesses in view of surge in number of COVID-19 cases.
Time bound
“In many civil and criminal cases, the High Court has issued directions to the district and trial courts in the State to complete the trial in a time-bound manner. Considering the SOP, if the there is difficulty to meet the deadline or complete the trial within the specified time, the time granted earlier stands extended by three months from today,” the Bench said.
