Inauguration of Warrant Management System and PIL Portal

Cuttack: On 7th August, 2023, Warrant Management System and PIL Portal were inaugurated in virtual mode by Dr. Justice S. Muralidhar, Chief Justice, High Court of Orissa in presence of Justice Subhasis Talapatra, Chief Justice Designate and Chairperson, Artificial Intelligence and Information Technology Committee of the High Court, Justice Biswanath Rath, Chairperson, State Court Management System Committee and the Judges of the High Court of Orissa.

Among others, Shri Sunil Bansal, Director General of Police and Shri Binaytosh Mishra, Director, State Crime Records Bureau (SCRB), Odisha and all the District Judges and judicial officers of the state joined the event through virtual mode.

In the last two and half years series of e-Initiatives were implemented by the High Court of Orissa including e-filing, epayment of court fees, digitization, hybrid hearing, paperless courts, e-libraries, live streaming of court proceedings and so on. Warrant Management System and PIL Portal are the latest additions to the series.
Warrant Management System is a portal of the High Court of Orissa, developed in coordination with the State Crime Records Bureau, (SCRB) Odisha to ensure expeditious transmission and tracking of warrants. The portal has the facility of issuing warrants to the police, tracking the status of execution of the warrants and acknowledgement of warrant execution. Various types of warrant such as non-bailable warrants, bailable warrants, Distress Warrant, Recommitment etc. can be issued through this portal. While issuing warrants, the details of the warrantee existing in the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and Systems (CCTNS) can be automatically fetched to avoid erroneous data entry and reduce time. The warrants issued by the Courts will be notified on the dashboard of the local CCTNS module instantly, so that the concerned Police Officer can take immediate steps for execution of the same. Details of the executed warrants can be maintained in the portal for effective tracking and monitoring of the same by the Courts and the Police. Other features such as Modification of warrantee address with history log, Recall of warrants, Re-generation of warrants and Viewing of warrants etc. are also available for the Courts. Login credentials have been provided to all the warrant issuing Courts with different User Roles such as High Court Admin, District Court Admin and Court Staff for secure and effective management of the Warrant Management System.

This portal also provides report module to generate reports of various types Police Station Wise Warrant Report, Court Wise Warrant Report etc. with the facility for exporting it to excel sheets. Warrant Management System was first made functional for the Cuttack district and now it has been made functional for 7 districts namely, Angul,
Balasore, Ganjam, Khurda, Koraput, Sambalpur and Rourkela in the district of Sundargarh. In the next phase it would be made functional in other districts.

PIL Portal is a tool through which the public can know about the important Public Interest Litigations (PIL) in the High Court, its relevant orders, reports etc. which will also help the researchers and students.

Speaking in the inaugural function Dr. S. Muralidhar expressed concern over pendency of huge number of unexecuted warrants in the police stations across the state and said it is not in the interest of rule of law if the executing arms of the court are unable to submit compliance report in respect of the warrants forwarded to them. He added, the role of executing arms is crucial to ensure rule of law. The Chief Justice informed that as many as 61,000 non-bailable warrants, 57000 bailable warrants, 3700 distress warrants and about 600 recommitment warrants are now pending for execution by the police stations, and hopefully, the Warrant Management System will help reduce these numbers.

Speaking on the PIL Portal the Chief Justice said very often the lawyers filing PILs are not able to know that the same issue has already been pending before the court in an earlier filed PIL which leads to multiplicity of litigations. He said the lawyers bringing petitions before the court in the matters of public interest should be more responsible and ensure that the issue is not already pending before the court. The Chief Justice said the PIL Portal will help the citizens and the lawyers know the status of various PILs and the relevant orders and it also gives links to the live streaming hearings of PIL cases and reports of expert committees appointed by the court. He expressed hope that both the Warrant Management System and the PIL Portal will go a long way in serving the cause of justice.

Justice Subhasis Talapatra said non-execution of warrants affect the trial and very often the trial courts remain in darkness without any clue about the warrants issued by them. He said it is a malady affecting the administration of justice and the Warrant Management System will be an effective tool to address the issue. Justice Talapatra expressed hope that both the e-initiatives will further the ends of justice.

Justice Biswanath Rath said that at the first instance the Warrant Management System is being made functional for 7 districts and very soon it would be implemented in other districts after availability of infrastructure. Justice Rath hailed the PIL Portal as a much needed initiative to make the general public aware of the issues taken up by the court in Public Interest Litigations.

Shri Binaytosh Mishra, Director, State Crime Records Bureau thanked the High Court for the initiatives and said it would ease the work of the executing agency and ensure much better coordination with the issuing courts.