The Nepali Judiciary - Supreme Court Of Nepal

Chapter One
Introduction
1.1 Background
The Nepali judiciary for the past fifteen years had been looking for an opportune moment to include
novel disciplines regarding management in its working procedures. In the past, the judiciary had
been identifying its problems and through various researches had been making an effort to follow
the various principles of management. It was realized that reform of justice was not possible
through such studies only and that such reforms was possible only through the determination of
definite targets and objectives and commitments. Realizing this fact, the Nepali judiciary had for
the first time formulated and implemented its five-year Strategic Plan (2061-2066).
If we are to look into the universal practice, the concept of planning, development and
management had entered the judicial process only after the development of the management
processes. With the concept of a separate plan for the judiciary, the process of planned
development commenced after fifty years in Nepal. The judiciary was vested with the responsibility
of protecting the fundamental rights of its citizens and was also vested with the constitutional
responsibility of guaranteeing rule of law in the country and where the core plan of the country was
unable to address these important issues of the judiciary, a separate strategic plan for the judiciary
was deemed necessary, which is evident from the situation analysis of the past plans.
While initiating the process of formulating the Plan five years ago, the physical infrastructure and
financial resources of the court were in a deplorable condition. There were no clear plan for
development of its human resources and the level of security was not satisfactory. Likewise, there
was no clear vision to control and curb the delay in the judicial process and neither was there any
vision to control the irregularities within the judiciary. There was no mechanism to address
baseless and public comments made against the judiciary. Can the judiciary also formulate its own
plan? It was presumed that formulation of strategic plan was an intellectual exercise carried out by
limited individuals and within the periphery of such presumptions it was a challenging task for the
judiciary to conduct a situation analysis and come forward with a separate strategic plan.
Within the backdrop of having no experience regarding planning process, and if we are to look
back and see the progress made during the period of the first Plan, we realize that expected
achievements have not been made during the said period. If we are to evaluate the reform of the
judicial process on ideal standards vis-à-vis that crime had never been perpetrated, that debtor
had cleared all his debts and that decisions had never been overruled, then such evaluations
becomes impossible because complex human elements are attached in the judicial process whose
management is very difficult. Evaluation of the judicial process depends upon the public trust,
security and other valid circumstances which are related to a party and as such evaluation of such
matters cannot be expressed through physical or mathematical formula. The judiciary cannot
compromise even in the most complex circumstances and has to function under the basic
recognized principles of the judicial process. Therefore, evaluation of its achievements has to be
different than the evaluation of industrial, professional or administrative organization and verifiable
result indicators have been determined which need to be followed.
Whatever may be the status of achievement from review of the first Plan, the judiciary has to some
extent obtained experience regarding implementation of the Plan. Capacity has been developed in
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