Long-delayed live-streaming of some cases at Supreme Court to begin today

The Supreme Court of India. (File image)

On September 26, 2018, the Supreme Court had passed an order allowing for proceedings on cases of national importance in India’s top court to be live-streamed. Four years on, the order is scheduled to be implemented from September 27 onwards with cases before the constitution benches of the Supreme Court set to be streamed live for all public.

Despite the 2018 order where the court accepted that streaming of court proceedings is in principle an extension of the principle of open court, the order awaited implementation.

Earlier this month, a full court decision was taken to open the live-stream from Supreme Court to enable telecast of certain cases. In its initial stages, the Supreme Court will begin by streaming proceedings before its constitution benches.

The proceedings will be telecast live on YouTube in the initial stage with the webcast scheduled to move over to a platform set up by the Supreme Court, the Chief Justice of India UU Lalit said in court on Monday.

Rules with respect to live-streaming and recording of proceedings were laid down by the Supreme Court’s e-committee in 2021 when the judicial system had adopted the virtual system of hearings owing to the pandemic. These rules will govern the Supreme Court’s live-streaming exercise.

The stage was purportedly set for opening live-streaming when the ceremonial proceedings on the last working day of Chief Justice of India NV Ramana were telecast live on August 26. However, the decision to open court proceedings for live telecast was taken during a full court meeting of all judges headed by the incumbent CJI, UU Lalit.

The move followed a letter written by Senior Advocate Indira Jaising to CJI UU Lalit calling for opening live-streaming for cases of national and public importance. Jaising was one of the petitioners in the 2018 case.

Once implemented, the mechanism for telecast of court proceedings will enable the general public to observe hearings on cases such as challenge to the EWS quota which is currently underway and challenge to abrogation of Article 370 which is likely to be listed for hearing following the Dussehra break.

The Supreme Court is not the first constitutional court to open its proceedings for public viewing. As many as six high courts have already been live-streaming their proceedings with Gujarat High Court being the first one to do so.