1CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

Our law must provide justice; law and justicecannot remain distant neighbours

P.N. Bhagwati1The Lok Adalat has not been an unknown institution of

Indian justice delivery system. Now, it is no longer anexperiment in India, but it is an effective and efficient,pioneering and palliative alternative mode of dispute settlementwhich is accepted as a viable, economic, efficient, informal,expeditious form of resolution of disputes.2 Today, Lok Adalatsystem is taken to be the repository of public confidence in viewof its intrinsic strength which knows no barricades as it flowsthrough the basic human percepts of equity, good conscience,fair play and natural justice. The seed of Lok Adalat mechanismwas sown in 1982 in Gujarat which has now grown as a largetree whose branches has been reached in every nook and cornerof the country. It is a democratized and alternative form offormal justice delivery system. It has been developed bycontinuous efforts of people with the intention to find anappropriate structure and procedure for providing speedy andless expensive justice to them. Lok Adalat strives to bring abouta conciliatory settlement in a dispute without using coercion,threat, fraud or undue influence against the parties to thedispute. The institution of Lok Adalat tries to resolve thedisputes by discussions, counselling, persuasions, negotation,conciliation and with the mutual and free consent of the

1. See K.M.H. Rayappa, Lok Adalat : Objectives, Pre-Requisites,Strategis and Organisation, 14 Indian Bar Review, 711 at 715(1987).

2. Jitender N. Bhatt, "A Round Table Justice Through Lok Adalat(People's Court) A Vibrant ADR in India," (2002) 1 SCC (Jour) 11.

2parties. The Lok Adalat functions not as a substitute but as asupplementary to the ordinary courts for reducing the workload of these courts.

The vernacular meaning of Lok Adalat is Peoples Courtbut it does not seem to be an ordinary court in its acceptedconnotation. There is no standardized or statuary definition ofthe term, it is now widely accepted as an informal, voluntary,dispute settlement agency involving the people and publicspirited lawyers and citizens.3 The basic idea behind thescheme of Lok Adalat is to speed up clearance of pendency ofhuge arrears in courts and fulfil the Constitutional goal ofaccess to equal, fair and efficacious justice to all irrespective ofreligion, race, caste, sex, place of birth and socio-economicposition.

It is a participatory justice forum developed by contestedparties, lawyers, judges, law teachers, social activists, legalaiders and public spirited people belonging to every walk of life.The forum is contrived for enabling the common people toventilate their grievances against the State agencies or againstother citizens and to seek a just settlement of their disputes. Itsmain function is to enable the parties who voluntarily seek theAdalats intervention to understand their respective rights andobligations with reference to the dispute brought before it andto help keep the dialogue going in a fair manner.4 Apart frombeing good samaritans role of members of Lok Adalat is toclarify the law and by gentle persuasion to convince the partieshow they stand to gain by an agreed settlement.5

3. N.R. Madhava Menon, Lok Adalat in Delhi: A Report from a LegalEducation Perspective, 12 Indian Bar Review, 415 at 416 (1985).

4. N.R. Madhava Menon, Lok Adalat : Peoples Programme for SpeedyJustice, 13 Indian Bar Review, 129 at 132 (1986).

5. Ibid.

3The salient features of this form of dispute resolution areparticipation, accomodation, fairness, expectation,voluntariness, neighbourliness, transparency, efficiency andlack of animosity.6 Lok Adalat strive to resolve the disputes,which are not only pending in courts but also those, which havenot yet reached courts, by adopting persuasive methods,common sense and human approach to the problems ofdisputants.

Lok Adalat is fairly on old form of adjudicating systemprevailed in ancient India. Lok Adalat has long tradition andhistory to settle the disputes on basis of principles of honesty,fair play and moral character as embodied in Indian cultureand civilization. The institution was prevailed in the Indiansociety at the grass root level in name of People's Court orPopular Court or Panchayats. The village Panchayats orPeople's Court, as an integral part of justice delivery system,played a very remarkable role in ancient and medieval Indiaalso. The importance and functioning of this institution hasbeen discussed in the texts of Yajnavalkya, Narad, Gautama,Kautilya, Brihaspati, Manu and Bhrigu. Generally, thesePeople's Court were of three kinds namely Puga, Sreni andKula. These court were consisted of local, reputed and honestpersons who decided the matters without following any rigidand complex proceedural laws and provided justice to thedisputants at their doorsteps. They did not give importance tothe legal technicalities and laid much stress upon the amicablesettlement of the disputes. The mechanism brought theharmony and unity in society and endeavoured to further thesocial solidarity.

6. Anurag, K. Agarwal, Strengthening Lok Adalat movement in India,AIR 2006 Jour 33 at 35.

4During Muslim period in India, these people's court withdifferent names as panchayats continuously functioned withminor variations. Throughout the Muslim rule there was nodirect or systematic state control of the administration ofjustice in the villages where most of India lived.7 At that time,these panchayats were empowered to dispense justice in allpetty civil and criminal matters in accordance with the customor usages of the locality, caste, trade or family. The Muslimrulers traditionally enjoyed and occasionally exercised a generalpower of supervision over all these popular courts. Theprocedure followed by these courts was quite simple, systematicand informal. There was no regular administration of justice, nocertain means of filing a suit and fixed rules of proceeding afterthe suit had been filed.8 These People's Court or VillagePanchayats worked for a long time and existed even at the timeof commencement of the British rule in India. The British rulersdiscouraged administering of justice through People's Courts orvillage Panchayats and established their own hierarchy offormal courts to render justice in civil and criminal matters.They moulded the ancient Indian legal system according to theirvested interest with the result that the functioning of people'scourt withered away and became empty and suffocating withengulfing nothingness.9 In this way, they gave a death blow tothe functioning of people's courts.

However, after independence, the existing judicial systemhas also not fulfil the passionate demand of justice of people inthe country. Because, the present justice delivery system wasinherited from the Britishers being archaic and sudden withobscurantism is not suitable to the Indian socio-economic

7. Sen Gupta, Evolution of Ancient Indian Law, 112(1953).8. U.C. Sarkar, Epoches In Hindu Legal History, 250 (1958).9. P. Parameswaran, "Dispensation of Justice : Problem of Cost,

Quality and Delay," AIR 1991 Jour 31.

5structure and its tradition and culture. There are severalhurdles and barriers in the way of getting justice by commonman in the ordinary courts such as cost of litigation,corruption, delay in disposal of cases, outdated and technicalprocedures, delay due to appeal, review and revision whichincrease the arrears at all level in judicial courts, etc. Due tothese drawbacks of judicial system, the common man hasstarted feeling that justice is a 'myth' or a 'fiction'. The abovementioned factors have not only weakened the judicial systembut also swiftly shaken the confidence of the people and theimage of the courts in the society.10

In every civilization, access to justice has been a dream oflegal lumanries, social workers, judges, downtrodden peopleand the government also. Since, in the failure of the judicialsystem, the people may start to use the inhuman and illegalmethods for getting justice. Bearing this fear in mind, thefounding fathers of our National Charter intended that thelargesse of law must belong to all irrespective of religion, race,caste, creed, colour, sex, wealth and income. Therefore, theframers embodied many provision11 in the Constitution in orderto promote the goal of justice and establishing the conditionnecessary for its achievement. The people's aspiration for trinityof justice, equality and liberty remained to be eluding all theseyears as the people at the lowest rung of the society found itwanting on account of their economic, social and otherdisabilities and also for want of people's participation in justicedelivery system i.e. Lok Adalat, until the incorporation of Article39A of the Constitution in 1976.12 This Article enjoins upon thestate to secure that the operation of the legal system promotes

10. Prabha Bhargava, "Lok Adalat : Justice At the Door Steps, 2(1998).11. Preamble, Arts. 14, 21, 38, 39A and 40.12. Guman Singh, "Permanent Lok Adalat for Public Utility Services : A

Statutory Land Mark," AIR 2003 Jour 354 at 355.

6justice on the basis of equal opportunity by providing free legalaid, by suitable legislation or schemes or in any other way, toensure that opportunities for securing justice are not denied toany citizen by reason of economic or other disability. Article39A is a fool proof, fundamental and each Indian's title deed ofequal justice through the legal system, a categoricalimperative.13

Similarly, Indian judiciary specially the Supreme Courthas played a significant role as an activist engineer to achievethe end of access to justice delivery mechanism. In catena ofcases,14 the Apex Court has declared that the right to free legalaid and speedy trial are the fundamental rights which comeunder the scope of Articles 14, 21 and 39A. Therefore, theSupreme Court has also laid down emphasis upon theestablishment of effective and qualitative justice deliverymechanism. Thus, it seems that effective, efficient, cheap andexpeditious justice through Lok Adalat system is theConstitutional commitment under its provisions because thesystem dispenses justice at the door steps of the people and inthis sense, endeavours to achieve the wishes of founders of theConstitution.

In the light of these Constitutional mandates, the modernversion of Lok Adalat arose out of the concern expressed by thecommittees setup to report on organising legal aid to the needyand poor people and the alarm generated by judicial circle onmounting arrears of cases pending for long time at different

13. V.R.K. Iyer, Equal Justice and Forensic Process : Truth and Myth,14(2010).

14. Hussainara Khatoon v. State of Bihar, AIR 1979 SC 1369; ManekaGandhi v. Union of India, AIR 1978 SC 597; M.H. Hoskot v. State ofMaharashtra, AIR 1978 SC 1548; Sunil Batra v. Delhi Administration,AIR 1980 SC 1599; Khatri v. State of Bihar, AIR 1981 SC 928;People's Union of Democratic Rights v. Union of India, AIR 1982 SC1473; Sheela Barse v. State of Maharashtra, AIR 1983 SC 378; A.R.Antulay v. R.S. Nayak, (1992) SCC 225.

7levels in the court system. The Report of Gujarat Legal AidCommittee (1971), the Report on Processual Justice to thePeople (1973) submitted to the Central Government and the"Juridicare: Equal Justice Social Justice Report" (1977)submitted by P.N. Bhagwati and V.R. Krishna Iyer JJconsistently advocated the need for revival of informal systemsof dispute resolution.15

Further the setting up of the Committee for ImplementingLegal Aid Schemes (CILAS) by the Union Government in 1980under the Chairmanship of P.N. Bhagwati CJ (as he then was)gave an impetus to the Legal Aid movement in general and theconcept of Legal Aid Camps and Lok Adalats in particular. Theintroduction of Lok Adalat system in Gujarat, as part of thestrategy of legal aid movement raised a fond hope to themillions of poor people who are denied equal justice under thepresent existing system. In order to implement the right toaccess to justice for the weaker sections and to reduce themounting arrears of cases in law courts, it is thought that thelaw should be utilized as an instrument of socio-economicchange. Keeping in view these objects, the Law Commission ofIndia in its Report also recommended for the establishment andstrengthen the Nyaya Panchayat at grass root level.16

It is evident that on the basis of these appreciablerecommendations, the experiment of Lok Adalat was started inGujarat in 1982. The first Lok Adalat was organized at village'Una' on March 14, 1982 in Junagarh District and inaguratedby Justice D.A. Desai. Soon, the Lok Adalat programme wasadopted by many other States and Union Territories and withthe passage of time, become very popular. In this backdrop, it

15. Supra note 1, 712.16. See one Hundred and Fourteenth Report of Law Commission of India

on Gram Nyayalya, (1986).

8became necessary to provide statutory backing to the LokAdalat and awards given by them. It was felt that such astatutory support would not only reduce the burden of arrearsof work in regular courts, but would also take justice to thedoor-steps of the poor and the needy and make justice quickerand less expensive. The magintude of the task of providingstatutory forum to Lok Adalat has been a cause of concern tothe judges, social workers, socially approached lawyers, lawteachers and all those who thought it to be the need of the dayto provide it uniform and competent efficacy without hamperingits inherent spirit. This was possible by the enactment of LegalServices Authorities Act, 1987 (for brevity 'The Act') wherebythe Lok Adalat has been given statutory dimension and the Actcame into force on 9 November 1995. The Act has been enactedwith a view, firstly, free and competent legal services to theweaker sections of the society and secondly, to ensure thatopportunities for securing justice are not denied to any citizenson account to economic or other disabilities and thirdly, toorganise Lok Adalats so that operation of legal system promotesjustice on the basis of equal opportunities. Therefore, the majorpurposes of the Act are to provide Legal Aid, to impart legalliteracy and to organise Lok Adalats with a view to strengthenthe justice delivery mechanism and promote the right of justiceto common people. The Act has been amended in 2002, with theobject to constitute 'Permanent Lok Adalats' for deciding thedisputes concerning 'Public Utility Services." The remarkableaspects of the Act are enumerated and explained as under.1. Legal Aid

The important aspect of the Legal Services Authorities Act,is to render free legal services to the eligible persons. For thispurpose, Section 12 of the Act emphasize that every person whofiles or defends a case is entitled to legal services if that person

9is a member of a Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe; a victimof trafficking in human beings or begar; a woman or a child; amentally ill or otherwise disabled person; a person undercircumstances of undeserved want such as being a victim of amass disaster, ethnic violence, caste atrocity, flood, drought,earthquake or industrial disaster; or an industrial workman; orperson in custody, including custody in a protective home or injuvenile home or in a psychiatric hospital or psychiatricnursing home; or any citizen of India whose annual incomefrom all sources does not exceed Rupees fifty thousand or suchhigher amount as may be notified by the State Governmentfrom time to time.17

The free legal services are provided to eligible persons onlyif the concerned Authority to whom the application for legalservices is made, is satisfied that such person has a prima faciecase to prosecute or to defend. An affidavit made by a person ashis income may be regarded as sufficient for making himeligible to the entitlement of legal services under this Act unlessthe concerned Authority has reason to disbelieve suchaffidavit.18

The free legal aid is obtained in any court of law upto theSupreme Court and in any Tribunal, Revenue Court as well asall departments of Government and other bodies dischargingquasi-judicial functions. The legal aid is available in all civil,criminal, revenue and administrative matters.19 Legal Servicesmay be provided in all or any one or more than one of thesemodes, namely: by payment of court fee, process fees, expensesof witnesses, lawyers fee and all other charges payable orincurred in connection with any legal proceedings; by

17. The Haryana State Legal Services Authority Rules, 1996, Rule 19.18. The Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987, Sec. 13.19. Supra note 17, Rule 20.

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representation by a legal practitioner in a legal proceedings; byobtaining of certified copies of judgments, orders, notes orevidence and other documents in the legal proceedings; bypreparation of appeal, paper book, including printing andtranslation of documents, in the legal proceedings; and bydrafting of legal documents.202. Legal Literacy

The other important aspect of the Act is to impart thelegal literacy among the people. Therefore, it is mandatory forvarious Legal Services. Authorities and Committees constitutedunder the Act, to organise Legal Literacy and Legal AwarenessCamps with the purpose to spread legal literacy and legalawareness amongst the people and, in particular, to educateweaker sections of the society about the rights, benefits andprivileges guaranteed by social welfare legislations and otherenactments as well as administrative programmes andmeasures. These authorities/committees organise regularlylegal literacy camps in the remote rural areas, urban slumsareas, industrial areas and labour colonies with the help ofretired judicial/executive officers, social workers, advocates,law teachers, law students and social welfare organisations.

In these camps, the people become conscious about thebenefits, rights, privileges and duties specified under variouswelfare laws such as Marriage Acts; Labour Legislations; Sexualharassment of women at working places; Maternity Benefit Act;Dowry Prohibition Act; Rights of Scheduled Castes, ScheduledTribes and Backward classes under the various Acts; Rights ofarrested persons; Panchayati Raj Act, Benefits of ADRs, LokAdalats and Plea Bargaining; Rights under Mahtama GandhiNational Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA); Rights toInformation Act, Environment and Pollution laws; Rights related20. Id., Rule 21.

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to health, hygiene and sanitation; Rights under ConsumerProtection Act, and Fundamental Rights, etc.

In these camps, the pamphlets, booklets and posterswhich contains informations about special rights of women,children, labourers, arrestees, scheduled castes and scheduledtribes, etc. are distributed to people. Therefore, these legalliteracy camps provide opportunity to people to know abouttheir rights and legal remedies for the protection of theserights. So, these camps seem to be a significant step forfulfilling the object of the Act.3. Lok Adalats

The Lok Adalat system has got the legal status under theLegal Service Authorities Act, 1987. The Act provides the twokinds of Lok Adalats viz. Lok Adalats and Permanent LokAdalats. In the Act, various Legal Services Authorities andCommittees21 are authorized to organize Lok Adalats at suchintervals and places for the purpose of settling the variousmatters22. Lok Adalats are empowered for the resolution of allcivil and compoundable criminal cases at pre-litigation as wellas at pending litigation stage by way of conciliation, persuationand negotiation between the disputants. These are bound tosettle the disputes on the basis of major human percepts ofequity, good conscience, and natural justice. However, these arenot provided with the imperative authority to dispense justiceon merits of the dispute.

The forum of Permanent Lok Adalat has been providedwith all the colours of the spectrum which includes the

21. Every State Legal Services Authority or District Legal ServicesAuthority or the Supreme Court Legal Services Committee or everyHigh Court Legal Services Committee or Taluk Legal ServicesCommittee.

22. Matrimonial Cases, Labour Disputes, Bank Loan Cases, ElectricityCases, Insurance Cases, Family Disputes, Property Disputes, ForestCases, Motor Accident Claim Cases, Revenue Cases, etc.

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settlement of disputes related to public utility services,23compoundable criminal offences and the matters where thevalue of property in dispute does not exceed ten lakh rupees. Inthe conciliation proceeding, the Permanent Lok Adalat isauthorized to formulate the terms of possible settlement whichmay be acceptable to the parties to enable them to reach at anamicable settlement. However, if the parties fail to reach at anagreement, the Permanent Lok Adalat has power to decide thedispute on merit except the non-compoundable offences.

The procedure followed by Lok Adalat or Permanent LokAdalat is simple, flexible, informal and devoid of alltechnicalities but varied as the nature of the problems. The LokAdalats or Permanent Lok Adalats are guided by the principlesof natural justice, objectivity, fair play, equity and otherprinciples of justice without being bound by the Code of CivilProcedure and the Indian Evidence Act. It has been conferredwith all the indicia of a court since it shall be deemed to be acivil court. So, it enjoys the same powers as that of a civil courtin summoning and enforcing the attendance of any witness;examining him on oath; reception of evidence on affidavits;requisition of any public record or document. Every award ofLok Adalat or Permanent Lok Adalat shall be final and bindingon all the parties to the dispute and shall be deemed to be thedecree of civil court. The award of Lok Adalat is based upon theconsent of the disputants, therefore, no appeal can be filedagainst the award. However, such award come under thedomain of the writ jurisdictions of the High Court and theSupreme Court only when the award has been against thestatutory provisions and the principle of natural justice.

23. Public utility services include transport services for the carriage ofpassengers or goods by air, road or water; postal, telegraph ortelephone services; supply of power, light or water to the public;system of public conservancy or sanitiation; services in hospital ordispensary and insurance service.

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Therefore, the Lok Adalat system is indeed a welcomedevelopment which provides an important juristic technologywith a view to unburden the workload of the courts as well as todispense cheaper, quicker and qualitative justice to thecommon people. Therefore, the researcher's main concern is tostudy the Legal Services Authorities Act with regard tofunctioning of Lok Adalats. The researcher has tried to examinethe extent of applicability of Lok Adalat system in the context ofconstitution, jurisdiction, powers, procedure, functions andworking of the Lok Adalats and need and scope of improvement.Object ives of the Study

The researcher has focused on the followingobjectives :

(1) To analyse the existing setup of Lok Adalat system.(2) To access the present working of the Lok Adalat

system.(3) To know the impact of Permanent Lok Adalat in the

administration of justice.(4) To find out the loopholes of existing Lok Adalat system.(5) To help find means for achieving the desired objects of

Lok Adalat system.Hypothesis

1. A review is needed for the setup of Lok Adalat system.2. Lok Adalat system is not working efficiently and

effectively.3. Creation of Permanent Lok Adalat is a positive step to

help the administration of justice.4. There is vast ambit of improvement in the Lok Adalat

system in the present scenario.

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Study Area

HARYANA

Keeping in view the importance of the Lok Adalat and thecapacity of this noble institution for dispensation of speedy andcheap justice, the researcher has undertaken the present workto study the working of Lok Adalats in India in general and inAmbala Division of State of Haryana in particular.

There are four division in the State of Haryana viz.Ambala, Hisar, Rohtak and Gurgaon. Ambala Division isconsisted of five districts viz. Panchkula, Ambala,Yamunanagar, Kurukshetra and Kaithal. The total geographicalarea of the Division is 8295 Sq. Kms. In this area, total42,96,085 people reside as per the census of 2001. The sex

Ambala Div i sion

Study Area

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ratio in the division is 854 females per 1000 males.24 The peopleof various religions such as Hindu, Sikh, Muslim, Christian,Buddhists and Jains reside in the division. A large populationof the division consists of refugees who came from Pakistanafter partition of India. Now, they are playing a significant rolein the social, political, economic, cultural and educationaldevelopment of this region.

The economy of the division is primarily agrarian. Most ofthe people are engaged in agricultural pursuits. Theagriculturists are also actively involved in dairy farming,poultry farming, pig farming, etc. as a side business. Thedivision enjoys an ideal location being situated adjacent toNational Highway No. 1 and therefore coming up as animportant industrial belt of Haryana. But, being agriculturebased economy, industrial setup in the division is also agro-based, as there are number of rice shellers, food processingunits, sugar mills, solvent, paper mills, card board factories,milk plants, fisheries, plywood industries, etc. Besidesagriculture based industries, the other industries are metal andutensil units; mechanical engineeringbased industries;chemical and fertilizers industries; pharmaceutical units; soap,detergent, rubber and plastic manufacturing factories; electricaland electronics industries, etc. A good number of people of thisarea are also engaged in service sectors such as banking,insurance, hospitality, management, teaching, nursing, etc. TheAmabla Division is also developing as an educational hub.There are two universities one at Kurukshetra and other atMullana and one National Institute of Technology atKurukshetra. A large number of engineering, law, polytechnic,nursing, education and management colleges are established inthe region for imparting qualitative education to the youth. In24. www.haryanaonline.in-visited on 18/7/2010.

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view of above said features of the study area, the researcherhas tried to analyse the functioning of these Lok Adalats in thisstudy area with the intention that it may help in strengtheningthe Lok Adalat system.Research Methodology

Looking at the requirement and usefulness of the topic ofresearch for society, economy and justice delivery mechanism,the researcher has adopted empirical and analytical researchmethodology. The relevant and necessary data has beencollected from both primary as well as secondary sources. Theresearcher has attended the Lok Adalats and Permanent LokAdalat organised at distinct places in the study area from timeto time to collect relevant data and to observe the working ofthe Lok Adalat system. The researcher has also interviewedvarious. Legal Services Authorities for the purpose. The datahas been tabulated and computed with simple statisticaltechniques. The researcher has referred the Law CommissionReports; the Reports of other Committees such as Gujarat LegalAid Committee (1971), Expert Committee on Legal AidProcessual Justice to the People (1973), Report of theCommittee on National Juridicare: Equal Justice-Social Justice,(1971), etc.; notifications of Central and Haryana StateGovernment and judgements of the Supreme Court and variousHigh Courts. The relevant material available in the books,newspapers, journals, periodicals, proceedings ofseminars/conferences and internet has also been used.Scheme of the Study

The study has been divided into seven chapters. TheChapter I deals with introductory part of the work.

Chapter I I of the research work deals with Concept andNature of Lok Adalat . In this Chapter, the Constitutionalprovisions relating to Lok Adalats, present judicial system and

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its drawbacks, alternative disputes resolution mechanism, theconcept, nature and benefits of Lok Adalat system have beenexamined in detail.

Chapter I I I of the study is Historical Perspec t ive relatedto gensis, importance, kinds, structure, powers and proceduresof Lok Adalats in Ancient, Medieval, British and PostIndependence Period.

Chapter IV relates to Legal Framework for Lok Adalat swhich emphasizes about the various Legal Services Authoritiesat National, State and District level and Committees at SupremeCourt, High Court and Taluk level. In the chapter, it has alsobeen discussed in detail about the constitution, powers,functions and working of these bodies.

The Chapter V of the study Lok Adalat Law and JudicialApproach has been devoted to discussion on the provisions ofthe Act which are designed to organize and constitute the LokAdalats in the country in uniform manner. It covers theorganization and composition of Lok Adalats by variousauthorities and committees, jurisdiction of Lok Adalats,cognizance of cases by Lok Adalats, powers of Lok Adalats,Permanent Lok Adalats, award of Lok Adalats, execution ofawards of Lok Adalats, weaknesses of Lok Adalat. All theseaspects of Lok Adalat system have been examined in the light ofjudicial pronouncement made by the Apex Court and variousHigh Courts while interpreting the provisions of the Act.

For analysing the actual implementation of the Lok Adalatsystem the Chapter VI relates to Performance of Lok Adalatsin Ambala Div ision. The Chapter covers the result of analysison the basis of relevant data collected from different primaryand secondary sources. In the division, Lok Adalat system isfunctioning for settlement of disputes since 1985. Afterenforcement of the Legal Services Authorities Act in State in

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1996, the Lok Adalats are being organized by various legalservices authorities and committees. During the period of 1996-2009, 862 Lok Adalats have been organized in Ambala division.These Lok Adalats have settled 123801 cases out of 245912cases which brought before them for amicable resolution.Similarly the other kind of Lok Adalats i.e. Samjhuta Sadanshave disposed of 11332 cases out of 30829 referred cases.Permanent Lok Adalat related to public Utility Services havedetermined 1823 cases out of 2007 taken up cases duringperiod of 2007-2009. Lok Adalats are determining differentkinds of cases such as MACT cases, Insurance cases, Familydisputes, Electricity cases, Pension cases, Civil and Revenuecases, Petty criminal cases, Bank loan cases, Labour disputes,Pre Litigative cases, etc. The Chapter also concerns with theresponse of interviews and discussion with beneficiaries,advocates, concerned authorities, members of Lok Adalats andgeneral public.

Last Chapter VII of the work deals with conclusion of thestudy and some valuable suggestions on different aspects ofLok Adalat mechanism with a hope to improve and to meet thechallenges of the time.