NEW DELHI: CJI Surya Kant on Saturday unveiled details of his ‘Unified Judicial Policy’ (UJP) idea and said courts will give top priority to cases related to personal liberty, ensure predictability in decisions in commercial and economic matters to boost investor confidence and deal sensitively with disputes related to family, consumers and social justice.Addressing the Regional Judicial Conference in Jaisalmer, the CJI said that citizens approach courts not only for relief but also in the hope that the law will be consistently applied, freedoms will be upheld, rights will be clarified and governments will be held accountable.He said the predictability of the legal system without legal jargon was important to promote public understanding and maintain trust in the system. Predictability is rooted in consistency, reason, precedent and timely elimination, he said, adding: “Investors look for it, defendants rely on it, families hope for it and society depends on it.”“A judicial system that operates unpredictably or without clear guiding principles inevitably weakens public trust because litigants cannot predict how similar cases will be handled or when their matters will be resolved,” said CJI Kant. “When court outcomes reflect principled thinking, consistent application of law and transparent development of doctrine, trust in the courts is strengthened as people understand that justice does not depend on chance but is guided by established norms.””Technology has emerged as a constitutional tool that strengthens equality before the law, expands access to justice, and increases institutional efficiency. It enables the judiciary to overcome physical barriers and bureaucratic rigidities to deliver timely, transparent and principled results.The judicial systems, one run by HCs in the states and the other run by SCs at the national level, do not function in parallel, he said, while underlining the need for a UJP where technology will be the engine to ensure convergence of the two systems by harmonizing procedural norms, prioritizing cases, eliminating delays and formulating coherent judgments across jurisdictions. “But technology alone cannot sustain the rule of law; it must function alongside the deeper constitutional traditions that anchor judicial behavior and maintain institutional coherence,” he said.CJI Kant said uniformity in judgment and reasoning was a must in cases of similar nature. “A unified judicial policy is not just an administrative doctrine; it is the architecture of constitutional trust. It reinforces the idea that our courts are not isolated entities but parts of a republic, guided by shared values and delivering a coherent justice system,” he said.“Ultimately, the measure of innovation is not the complexity of the software we use, but the simplicity with which a citizen understands the outcome of their case and believes that justice has been served,” he emphasized.
