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Artificial Intelligence can supplement but not supplant a judge; cannot be allowed to determine outcome of case
Recently, the Supreme Court has unveiled its Artificial Intelligence (AI) portal SUPACE, designed to make research easier for judges, thereby easing their workload.
Need for Artificial Intelligence in Indian Judicial System
- The Supreme Court Portal for Assistance in Court’s Efficiency (SUPACE) is a tool that collects relevant facts and laws and makes them available to a judge.
Need for Artificial Intelligence in Indian Judicial System
- Collegium system has degenerated into cronyism: The appointments of judges to the higher judiciary, the high courts and the Supreme Court, will see a change in the 2020s.
- The collegium system has exposed its weaknesses with merit as a mere sideshow.
- Extended Lockdowns because of increasing pandemic: The extended lockdown in the wake of COVID-19 radically changed the lifestyles of all players in the field of justice such as litigants, lawyers and judges, forcing them to resort to online resolution of disputes.
- It would necessarily entail massive investment in the hardware and software required for effectively running virtual courts in the country.
- Shortage of judges and increasing pendency of cases: Indian judiciary has been facing a shortage of judges and an increasing number of pending cases in different courts.
- There is a lot of pressure on the judiciary to deliver quality judgments in all the cases within a reasonable time frame.
- AI Ethics as soft law: It is largely about ‘responsibility’ and ‘trustworthiness’.
- The AI technology has to pass the scrutiny of being genuine with respect to making, object, use, after-use and the consequences from the same.
- Speedy organization of judicial cases: The AI will bring references into the judgment and organize cases at a speed not seen so far as it.
- Inclusion of marginalised communities deprived of justice: The technology will ensure that those who do not have access to justice due to distance will not be excluded anymore.
- Fixing ever-increasing vacancies and judicial cases: Approximately 25–45 per cent of judicial posts remain vacant for unduly long periods, which puts a disproportionately large burden on the incumbents of other posts.
- An AI-based system specifically designed for a particular judicial task could prove to be very effective in assisting the judges with making decisions, thus enabling them to achieve their target smoothly.
- In the judiciary, AI facilitates the legal teams to concentrate on more crucial and strategic work by automating certain mundane processes.
- Working towards contract management and people development: The AI will solve the problems by making contract management faster and more reliable.
- The AI will help in freeing up resources so legal departments can focus on building the quality of their human legal teams.
- Ability to measure fairness: It solely deals with the competence of an AI device to evaluate facts and undergo a non-discriminatory decision-making process independent of potential algorithmic biases.
- Computerization and interconnectivity of courts: The e-courts mission mode project has led to a robust framework to facilitate an open access to large bundles of information captured by Indian courts.
- Mammoth task of implementing AI in judiciary: The experts believe that in a democracy based on adult franchise and wedded to the rule of law, like India, this could be a herculean task.
- India has a brilliantly worded constitutional document but there are millions who are unaware of the true nature of the Constitution.
- Judicial accountability is at stake: The experts believe that judiciary’s accountability may be reduced due to the incomprehensibility of the AI-based system.
- Issue of automation bias or prejudice: It is apprehended that the use of AI in the decision making could possibility of having an ‘automation bias or prejudice.
- Current data with judiciary is scattered: The computerisation and interconnectivity of courts under the e-courts mission mode project has led to a robust framework to facilitate an open access to large bundles of information captured by Indian courts.
- In the absence of an overarching open data policy, this information, collected by the judiciary, remains scattered and haphazard.
- Need to educate people on their rights under Constitution: The access to information through low-priced telecommunications infrastructure will multiply the speed with which people will be able to learn and exercise their rights.
- AI & Judiciary as subject matter curriculum: Constant study, R&D and exploration of AI in judiciary under an experimental rubric is the sine qua non of general research into AI.
- The specialized expert committees, civilized discourse and sharing of information are some of the components which shall help in formulating trust, building a mechanism and filling the void in Judiciary.
- Reduction of judicial complexity: It must be substantiated, transparent and offer a level playing field to the litigants.
- In order for AI to be able to process legal information effectively, the legal information must first be made machine processable.
- Correction of legally incorrect decisions: The AI can be used much more effectively once legal information such as court decisions is made machine-processable before publication with textual readability, document structures, identification codes and metadata all available.
- Ethical guidelines on using AI in courts: The AI must be able to explain how the result came about, judiciaries must digitise their information and provide legal interpretation.
- Though the benefits of adopting an AI-based system to a greater extent in the judiciary seem tempting as it promises to improve its efficiency drastically, it should be utilized to a limited extent only for assisting the judges that too after thorough scrutiny.
- It is important to study AI & Judiciary as a subject matter curriculum beyond the very need of systemic mobilization, because such mobilization again has to be based on some motives, and so the human factor must be protected no matter what.
- The AI in the judiciary needs to be better than humans in terms of explainability, strategy implementation and digesting what it consumes.
- An open data policy setting out ground rules of data accessibility, as well as carving exceptions to preserve individual informational privacy, is a sine qua non for the Indian judiciary in today’s digital age.
POSTED ON 11-04-2021 BY ADMIN
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