Calcutta high court starts live streaming of proceedings

The Calcutta high court has started live streaming of the proceedings as a trial run. The nearly six-hour-long streaming of proceedings of a bench of acting chief justice TS Sivagnanam and justice Hiranmay Bhattacharyya got over 6800 views on the first day on Monday.

Streaming is likely to become a regular feature and likely to be extended to all the benches.

In 2018, the Supreme Court declared live telecast of court proceedings was part of the right to access justice under Article 21 of the Constitution. The court said that the judiciary needed to move apace with technology to promote a greater degree of confidence in the judicial process.

Supreme Court’s e-Committee later came out with model guidelines to regulate live-streaming of court proceedings in India.

In August 2022, the Supreme Court live-streamed its first proceedings confined to that of a ceremonial bench that bid adieu to then Chief Justice of India NV Ramana.

A full court a month later decided to live-stream constitution bench proceedings regularly with the e-Committee leading the move. Currently, all constitution bench proceedings are live-streamed.

The high courts of Gujarat, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Patna, and Orissa have also started live streaming of proceedings.

Established on July 1, 1862, the Calcutta high court is the oldest in India with jurisdiction over West Bengal and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

The Calcutta high court in February 2020 allowed live streaming of proceedings of a plea for the entry of children born to Parsi women and non-Parsi men into a Zoroastrian place of worship.

The Parsi Zoroastrian Association of lawyer Phiroze Edulji sought permission for live streaming saying the matter was of utmost importance to all Parsis.