With almost a decade of enactment of information technology act 2000 (IT Act 2000) and almost five years since Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law and CEO of the exclusive e-courts training and consultancy centre of India (ECTCCI) and of the world suggested the same, the Supreme Court of India has finally accepted the suggestion to send legal notices through e-mails.The Supreme Court of India on Monday decided to experiment with email notices to respondents to cut the delay in the traditional method of serving notices. A bench comprising of Chief Justice of India S H Kapadia, Justices K S Radhakrishnan and Swatanter Kumar gave this order.
The bench also clarified that it is not making a new rule but providing for an additional mode for service of notices. The traditional method of notice sending is still kept intact.
The bench also realised that there may be some difficulties in implementing this initiative. It asked all the lawyers present in the court about putting in practice the serving of notice through emails, at least to start with in commercial matters.
This is a good step in the right direction especially after the failure of the e-courts project of India. Due to lack of political and judicial will and techno legal expertise, India is still waiting for the establishment of first e-court in India.
Now at least the Supreme Court of India has started covering the basic aspects related to establishment of e-judiciary in India.
