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Draft   to   enact   procedure  
CT.04   ---   Jury   System   in   State Govt Quasi-Courts





 
Jury System in Quasi Courts --- Section   1   :   Preamble
  This Act is to create a less nexusprone procedure for citizens to resolve disputes in the quasi-courts under State Govt.

Section   2   : Format of the act
2.1 Many of the clauses of this law are procedures or instructions, which may be an order or a request. The clause has list of persons for whom that procedure/instruction is meant for.

Section   3   : Appointments of senior officers and their main powers
3.1 [Person responsible for this procedure/directive: CM ; Purpose: Appointment of senior officers] Within 2 days after passing this law, the CM will explcitly classify Quasi-Courts under State Govt as "District-related" or "State-related". The CM will appoint 1 Registrar for the State and 1 Jury Administrator per Quasi Courts.

Section   4   : Procedure for citizens to replace Jury Administrators
4.1 [Person responsible for this procedure/directive: Registrar, Registrar’s clerks] A citizen residing in a District city can present his ID and specify the serial numbers of at most 5 candidates he Approves for the position of Jury Administrator in a District-related Quasi-Court in his District, or specify the serial numbers of at most 5 candidates he Approves for the position of Jury Administrator in a State-related Quasi-Court. The clerk will enter the requests in the systems and give the receipt to the citizen. The citizen can change his choices any day any month.
4.2 [Person responsible for this procedure/directive: Registrar] The clerk may charge a fee of Rs 2 to Rs 5 to the citizen.
4.3 [Person responsible for this procedure/directive: Registrar] The citizen can withdraw his Approvals any day. There will be no fee from withdrawing the Approvals.
4.4 [Person responsible for this procedure/directive: CM ; Purpose: Replacement of Jury Administrator]
  • For District-related Quasi-Court, if any candidate is approved by highest number of citizen-voters and over 25% of ALL citizen-voters in that District, the CM will appoint him as new JA within 2 days. If any candidate is approved by over 25% of ALL citizen-voters and his approval is 1% more than existing JA, the CM will appoint him as new JA within 2 days. The CM will not remove JA, previously approved by citizens, unless Approval goes below 20% of ALL citizens.
  • For State-related Quasi-Court, if any candidate is approved by highest number of citizen-voters and over 25% of ALL citizen-voters of the State, the CM will appoint him as new JA within 2 days. If any candidate is approved by over 25% of ALL citizen-voters and his approval is 1% more than existing JA, the CM will appoint him as new JA within 2 days. The CM will not remove JA, previously approved by citizens, unless Approval goes below 20% of ALL citizens.
4.5 [Person responsible for this procedure/directive: Registrar; Purpose: allowing a citizen to be candidate for JA] Any citizen of India who wants citizens’ Approval for the position of JA can register himself with the Registrar. The Registrar will charge a deposit of Rs 1000 and a monthly fee Rs 100 per month. There will be no fee after over 5% of ALL citizens have approved the candidate.
4.6 [Person responsible for this procedure/directive: Registrar ; ] Word "citizen" in the context of Approval, means citizen above 18 and registered voter resident in the city

Section   5   : Formation of Grand Jury

5.1 [Procedure for JA i.e. Jury Administrator] Using the voter list, the JA will, in a public meeting, randomly select 30 citizens from the voter-list as the Grand Jurors. If the Quasi-Court is District-related, the JA will use the voter list of that District or he will use the voter-list of the State.

5.2 to 5.6 [same as 5.2 to 5.6 of section5 of "Jury System over Municipality Staff" Act]

Section   6   : Meetings of Grand Jurors and compensation

[ same as section6 of "Jury System over Municipality Staff" Act]

Section   7: Proceedings of a Quasi-Court

7.1 [Procedure for Citizens] If any citizen has a case that comes under the scope of the quasi-court, he can present the case to the Grand Jurors. The complainer must mention whether he wants cancellation of the order passed by a lower authority and/or he wants to obtain possession of a propertry and/or he intends the accused to undergo finr/imprisonment. If over 15 Grand Jurors, in a meeting, issue an invitation, the complainer may appear.

7.2 [Procedure for JA] If over 15 Grand Jurors declare that there is some merit in his case, the JA will call a JURY consisting of 12 citizens from the District (if the quasi-court is District-related) or State (if the quasi-court is State-related) to examine the complaint.

7.3 [Procedure for JA] JA will appoint an assistant as a CC (Case Coordinator). The CC will be selected at random on every hearing of the case. Preferably, the CC should have LLB, but this will not be a must.

7.4 [Procedure for Case Coordinator] The trial will go from 11am to 4pm. The trial will start only after all 12 Jurors and the complainer have arrived. If any party has not arrived, the parties who have arrived must wait till 4pm and then only they can go home.

7.5 [Procedure for Case Coordinator] The CC will allow the complainer to speak for 1 hour, during which no can interrupt. Then CC will allow each party to speak for 1 hour alternatively. The case will go on like this on every day.
7.6 [Procedure for Case Coordinator] The case will go for at least 2 days. On the 3rd or later, if over 7 Jurors declare that they have heard enough, the case will go on for 1 more day. If on the next day, over 7 out of 12 Jurors declare that they would like to hear more arguments, the case will go on till over 7 say that case should end.

7.7 [Procedure for Case Coordinator] On the last day, after both parties have presented the case for 1 hour each, the Jurors will deliberate for at least 2 hours. If after 2 hours, over 7 Jurors say that they need no more deliberation, the CC will ask each to declare his verdict.

7.8 [Procedure for Case Coordinator, Grand Jurors] In case a Juror or a party does not show up or shows up late, the Grand Jurors after 3 months will decide the fine.


Section 8 : Issuing the verdict, and impact of verdict

8.1 [Procedure for CM] The complainer can seek one of the 4 remedies :
  1. cancellation of order issued by lower authority
  2. possession of a property and/or
  3. compensation from accused
  4. imprisonment of the accused
If over 8 out of 12 Jurors state that the order of lower authority is improper, the CM himself would cancel that order or would forward the order to the specific authority. If over 8 out of 12 Jurors declare that a property in dispute should belong to the complainer, the CM would ask the District Police Chief to evacuate the property and hand over it to the complainer. In case of fine/imprisonment, the CM willl award the fine/imprisonment as approved by over 8 Jurors.

8.2 [Procedure for CM] If 4 or more Jurors disagree complainer, the CM will not take any action and reject the complain.

8.3 The other party will have 30 days to appeal before State's High Courts' Grand Jurors to cancel the order of the Quasi-Court's Jurors.



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