The Committee, headed by Justice N V Ramana, who is also the second most senior judge of the court, conveyed the same to representatives of the Bar at a meeting on Friday evening.
A seven-judge Committee of the Supreme Court has decided to wait for two more weeks before taking a final call on resumption of physical hearings in the court, which has been hearing cases through videoconferencing since the lockdown.
The Committee, headed by Justice N V Ramana, who is also the second most senior judge of the court, conveyed the same to representatives of the Bar at a meeting on Friday evening.
The Committee, also comprising Justices Arun Mishra, R F Nariman, U U Lalit, A M Khanwilkar, D Y Chandrachud and L N Rao, held discussions over videoconferencing with Dushyant Dave, Senior Advocate and President of the Supreme Court Bar Association, Shivaji Jadhav, Advocate and President of the SC Advocates on Record Association, and Manan Kumar Mishra, Advocate and Chairman of the Bar Council of India.
The Secretary General read out the minutes of the meeting, where it was decided against resuming physical hearings for the time being in view of the advice from medical experts, sources said.
The Bar representatives apprised the Committee on the difficulties faced by lawyers and urged that physical functioning should resume as soon as possible.
The Committee said they are “fully conscious and deeply concerned” about the difficulties faced by lawyers and anxious to gradually restore normalcy in the physical functioning. But a “decision will have to be guided by a holistic assessment of the situation on the basis of medical advice” and considering the safety of all stakeholders, the Committee said.
Saying that it will reconvene after two weeks, the Committee asked the Bar representatives to discuss with the Secretary General and other Registrars about the type of cases that can be listed for hearing if it decides to reopen the court at least partially.