Soon, read Supreme Court judgments in your language  - Hindi, Telugu, Assamese, Marathi, Kannada, Odia and Tamil

A software application will help users read Supreme Court's English judgments in their own respective regional tongues.

In a novel measure, the Supreme Court will translate its judgments into all vernacular languages for the benefit of the public and litigants across the length and breadth of the country.

The software application is intended to be launched by mid-July. 

The app, similar to Google's text translation, is likely to be launched in a single phase and cover “all vernacular languages,” a source said.

The court was taking the help of the High Courts in making the move a success. Most likely, the new app would be launched in the inaugural function of the Supreme Court's new office buildings at Appu Ghar. President Ramnath Kovind is expected to preside over it, the source said.

The move is the brainchild of Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi.

The CJI, in an informal interaction with Supreme Court journalists in November last, where he was accompanied by the court's number two judge Justice S.A. Bobde, mooted the idea of translating the court's judgments into regional languages.

The CJI had said the project included not only translating the apex court judgments into Hindi and other vernacular languages but also to provide summaries of the apex court's verdicts. This, he had said, was to benefit litigants, who after fighting their cases for years, were left unable to read the judgments in their own cases for the sole reason that they did not know English.

In the Constitution Day function last year, President Kovind took the opportunity to laud Chief Justice Gogoi for proposing the initiative to provide certified copies of judgments, translated from English to regional languages, to litigants. 

Source | The Hindu | 4^th July 2019