A Day After Supreme Court Called Out HC Judges Over 'Unnecessary Coffee Breaks', Delhi High Court Revises Its Sitting & Lunch Timings

A day after the Supreme Court called out High Court judges over their taking unnecessary breaks during Court working hours, the Delhi High Court has issued a notification dated May 14 revising the sitting and lunch timings of judges (and Court staff).

As per this circular, the High Court judges will now hold Court between 10:30 AM-01:30 PM and 02:30 PM-04:30 PM. The time between 01:30 PM-2:30 PM will constitute the lunch hour, which has been increased by 15 minutes.

To recap, on May 13, a bench of Justices Surya Kant and N Kotiswar Singh was dealing with a matter pertaining to delay of nearly 3 years by the Jharkhand High Court in pronouncing verdict in reserved criminal appeals. Considering the larger issue of belated delivery of judgements by judges, it expressed an inclination to examine the "performance outputs" of High Courts across the country.

Justice Kant, in particular, questioned certain High Court judges' practice of rising for tea/coffee breaks, while commenting that if the judges only take lunch breaks, there would be better performance and results.

"How much we are spending on the system, what is the actual output? What is the performance scale? What is the benchmark which should be there? Some of the judges, we know, they work so hard, their commitment is something that we always feel proud...but there are other judges who are unfortunately disappointing us...there are certain things we are hearing and maybe this matter we would like to be very frank and blunt to deal with some of the avoidable issues which are unnecessarily inviting decision in terms of functioning of High Courts...they are usually getting up for tea break, coffee break, this break, that break...why don't they continuously work till...? Except that you need a lunch break. It will be better performance, better result also", remarked the judge.

The next day, on May 14, the Delhi High Court issued a notification (No.13/G-4/Genl.I/DHC), stating that the Full Court resolved to modify the timings on all working days. This circular also mentioned that the 4th Saturday of every month, which is currently observed as a holiday, shall henceforth be a working day for the Registry.