Kerala High Court dismisses lawyer's plea which alleged that only 20 cases are listed a day before Justice Mary Joseph

The Kerala High Court on Friday dismissed a plea moved by a lawyer alleging that only a very limited number of cases are listed each day before one of the sitting judges of the High Court [Yeshwanth Shenoy v The Chief Justice, High Court of Kerala & Ors.]..Justice PV Kunhikrishnan delivered the verdict..The petitioner, advocate Yeshwanth Shenoy, challenged the curtailment of the list of cases before Justice Mary Joseph to around 20 cases, when most judges have over 100 cases listed before them each day.According to him, the Chief Justice of the High Court, is the master of roster and he alone has the power to direct the High Court registry on how to list matters and no other judges can interfere with the same.In case it is the Chief Justice himself who has directed the registry to post a short list before Justice Joseph, the same would violate Article 14 of the Constitution of India, the lawyer contended.The petitioner further submitted that he was shocked at hearing that the single-judge's court only has 20 matters before it each day, especially since he had already noticed that many matters are adjourned. Moreover, many a time, the judge does not complete even the short list of cases, Shenoy stated.Shenoy's petition pointed out that the backlog of cases and rising pendency have been a sore point of contention between the executive and the judiciary, with the former blaming court vacations and the latter blaming judicial vacancies.He underscored that if some judges start limiting the number of cases before them so drastically, it would negate the goodwill brought about by other judges who hear hundreds of cases each day, work 18 hour shifts and even sit through the night to finish the matters before them.In light of the above, the plea sought a direction to the Registrar General of High Court to have a standard criterion for listing matters before various courts in accordance with the directions of the Chief Justice.It further sought a declaration that a minimum of 50 matters must be listed before every court in the High Court in addition to a ‘final disposal’ list, "considering the pendency of matters before the High Court and the right of litigants to Speedy Justice which is a fundamental right recognised under Article 21 of the Constitution of India".Shenoy is currently facing suo motu contempt of court proceedings initiated against him by a division bench of the court for allegedly misbehaving in the court of Justice Mary Joseph.The Bar Council of Kerala had subsequently issued a show cause notice to Shenoy which the lawyer has challenged before the High Court by way of a separate plea. Shenoy has also moved yet another plea seeking directions to refrain from listing cases of advocate Prerith Philip Joseph before Justice Joseph who is Prerith's mother. These three cases are still pending before the Court.