In 1986, the Judicial Fund Act was promulgated with the objective of providing financial autonomy to the judiciary. It envisioned the creation of a revolving fund governed by a chief justice-led board. The money in the fund would be used to promptly refund returnable court fees, penalty amounts, fines, guarantees or bail amounts.

The Act envisions government contribution to the fund, apart from the money raised from court orders. It says while refunding the court fees, penalties, fines, guarantees or bail amounts is the main priority, the fund can also be used in infrastructure development and to perform other activities relating to justice.

Similarly, the money could be used in providing rewards, constructing court buildings, residential buildings for the judges and other employees of a court, to extend, maintain and conserve such buildings and to purchase land.

However, 37 years since its promulgation, the Act has yet to come into effect. The government has not published the Act in the Nepal Gazette, which is a must for it to be official, nor have the regulations been prepared for its implementation. In the absence of any sign that the Act would come into effect anytime soon, a group of lawyers lodged a writ petition at the Supreme Court on Friday demanding an order for its implementation.

“The judicial fund is a must for the judiciary’s financial autonomy,” Raju Chapagain, one of the petitioners, told the Post. “We had to knock on the apex court’s door as the executive took no step for its implementation in all these years.” Countries like Canada and Kenya among others have created such funds.

The courts raise fees while accepting petitions, and a sum is collected in the form of guarantees or bail amounts. Currently, such money is deposited in an account but cannot be used by the state as revenue. As per the Supreme Court’s annual report for the fiscal year 2019-20, the deposits exceeded Rs8.9 billion. The government, in the succeeding fiscal year, transferred around Rs6 billion of it to state coffers. The remaining deposit amount is still over Rs2 billion.

The Supreme Court in 2021 constituted a committee, which suggested the money be used through a revolving fund. In several cases, courts make decisions to refund their fees and money collected in the form of penalties, fines, guarantees or bail amounts to the respective individuals.

In the lack of funds, the court needs to write to the finance ministry to pay back such amounts. This is time-consuming and full of bureaucratic hassles. “We had spoken on the necessity of creating the fund in order to ease the refund process,” Man Bahadur Karki, a joint secretary who was a member of the study team, told the Post. The money accumulated as court fee, guarantee or bail was over Rs2 billion when they submitted a report in July 2021.

The Supreme Court, in its annual reports submitted to the President, has raised the issue of setting up the fund but to avail. Chapagain said as the government has not made necessary investments in the judiciary, creating the fund would support the judiciary by ensuring an essential source of money.

“We have demanded the court direct the government to immediately publish the Act in the [Nepal] gazette and prepare necessary regulation for its execution,” said Chapagain. The first hearing is taking place on Sunday.

The five-member board led by the chief justice would have the senior-most justice of the Supreme Court, the law secretary and the attorney general as its members and the apex court registrar would act as the member secretary, as per the Act.