Cabinet clears `1,650 cr for free LPG connections, `7,210 cr for eCourts projects

In a major decision, the Union Cabinet, which is chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, has on Wednesday allocated Rs 1,650 crore towards the release of an additional 75 lakh free LPG connections under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) over a period of three years from financial year 2023-24 to 2025-26.

In another important decision, the Union Cabinet approved the third phase of eCourts Project as a central sector scheme with a financial outlay of Rs 7,210 crore to be implemented over four years.While briefing about the Cabinet decisions, Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur said that in case of Ujjwala 2.0, the first refill and stove will be provided free of cost to Ujjwala beneficiaries by the Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) and the cost of refill and two-burner stove, which amounts to Rs 2,200 per beneficiary, will be reimbursed to OMCs by the Central government.

Explaining about the eCourts Mission Mode Project, the union minister said that the project is the prime mover for improving access to justice using technology in line with the PM’s vision of “Sabka Sath, Sabka Vikas and Sabka Vishwas.” With this, all the courts in the country would become digital and paperless, he said.

A targeted subsidy of Rs 200 per 14.2 kg LPG cylinder for up to 12 refills per year is being provided to PMUY consumers. With the release of an additional 75 lakh connections, the number of PMUY beneficiaries will go up to 10.35 crore.

The decision in this regard has been taken to cover most of the eligible beneficiaries under the PMUY as some eligible households still do not have LPG connections due to multiple reasons such as new households are formed every year as a result of rising population, marriages, migration, nuclearisation of families, leftover households, extremely remote locations, etc.

Phase III of the e-Courts Project, beginning 2023, in India is rooted in the philosophy of “access and inclusion”, the minister said, adding that the third phase is aimed at ushering in a regime of maximum ease of justice by moving towards digital, online and paperless courts through digitisation of the entire court records, including legacy records and by bringing in universalisation of e-filing/e-payments through saturation of all court complexes with e-Sewa Kendras.

It will put in place intelligent smart systems enabling data-based decision-making for judges and registries while scheduling or prioritising cases, the minister said.

The main objective of the Phase-III is to create a unified technology platform for the judiciary which will provide a seamless and paperless interface between the courts, the litigants and other stakeholders.

The allocation of Rs 7,210 crore witnesses a four-fold jump in budget allocation from Rs 1,670 crore allocated in 2015 for the Phase 2 of the project. In the first phase, the government had allocated Rs 639 crore.

The third phase of e-courts also aims to add Artificial Intelligence into the judicial system and introduce features like Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for analysis of case pendency and forecasting future litigation as well.

The third phase of e-courts project will be implemented under the joint partnership of Department of Justice, Ministry of Law & Justice and eCommittee of the Supreme Court of India. Also, there will be tripartite agreement between the Central government, high courts and state governments. The upkeep and maintenance of facilities at e-courts would be the responsibility of state governments.