The Law Ministry’s National Mission for Justice Delivery and Legal Reforms comprising of the law minister and bureaucrats as members of the advisory and governing councils has received the government’s approval with an estimated Rs 7,000 crore ($1.56bn) earmarked for lower judiciary infrastructure development over five years.

The funding of the mission would be taken up by the central and the state government in the ratio of 75:25 with the central government’s outflow being around Rs 5,500 crore.

The mission has been set up to achieve “increasing access by reducing delays and arrears in the system” and “enhancing accountability through structural changes and by setting performance standards and capacities” in a time span of five years from 2011 to 2016.

The government had earlier given its ‘in principle’ approval when the mission was first conceptualised by the law ministry in 2009 in the form of a vision document.

Five-pronged strategic initiatives sought to be undertaken as a part of the mission include policy and legislative changes, re-engineering procedures and alternate methods of dispute resolution, focus on human resource development, leveraging ICT for better justice delivery and improving infrastructure, according to the law ministry’s press release.

The mission consisting of the Advisory Council, Governing Council, National Mission Leader and the Mission Directorate will have members drawn from the parliament and state government besides bureaucrats such as senior government officials, law secretaries and joint secretaries in pivotal roles with no representation from the bar councils or other advocates’ bodies.

The law minister would himself head both the Advisory Council and the Governing Council.