Rahul Gandhi targets Prasad over pendency of cases in courts

Congress President Rahul Gandhi today hit out at Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad over huge pendency of cases in courts and shortage of judges, and charged him with "peddling fake news" instead.

Prasad termed Gandhi's attack "deeply reprehensible" and tweeted: "Mr. Rahul Gandhi, the notice given to Cambridge Analytica for Data Manipulation has naturally worried you. Angry, frustrated and apprehensive, you are now dragging the judiciary."
Gandhi's attack came after Prasad accused the Congress of hiring the services of the controversial data firm, accused of harvesting data stolen from Facebook, in previous elections.

The charge has been denied by the Congress, which instead accused the BJP of using the services of the firm. 'Legal system collapsing under Pending Cases: Supreme Court 55,000+, High Court 37 Lakh+, Lower Courts 2.6 Crore+. Yet, a staggering 400 High Court and 6,000 Lower Court judges not appointed, while Law Minister preoccupied peddling fake news,' Gandhi said on Twitter, using the hashtag 'JudiciaryDemonetised'.

He also took a swipe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over delay in appointment of judges to the Supreme Court. "Justice K M Joseph, overturned President's rule in Uttarakhand in 2016. When his name was proposed for the Supreme Court, Modi ji's ego was hurt. Approval of over 100 judges, cleared for the Supreme Court and various High Courts are now on hold. #JudiciaryDemonetised(sic)," he said in another tweet.

Reacting to it, Prasad tweeted: "Mr Rahul Gandhi, maintaining your track record your team has failed you once again by not doing their homework. Average appointments of High Court Judges under UPA-1 was 86 per year, and in UPA-2 it was 79 per year. Under NDA it has been 109 per year."

"In 2016 a record 126 High Court Judges were appointed in one year- highest since independence. Since May 2014 NDA Govt appointed 17 SC Judges, 326 HC judges & made 304 additional judges permanent & also created 173 new posts of High Court Judges, compared to 20 created in UPA 2," he said in another tweet.

"Mr Rahul Gandhi, pendency is the legacy which UPA Govt of 10years had given us where judicial infrastructure development was the lowest priority. We r improving the situation by creating more infrastructure, more digitization & greater technology application in disposal of cases," he wrote on Twitter.

The Congress and the BJP have been engaged in a slinging match between each other accusing the other of using the services of the controversial data firm. The Facebook data scandal erupted after a whistleblower revealed that Cambridge Analytica, a data firm with ties to Trump's 2016 campaign, accessed personal data from 50 million users of the website without their knowledge, and might have kept that data even after the social media giant told the company to delete it.

Prasad recently insisted that the Congress has used the services of Cambridge Analytica and said several media reports about the opposition party using the services of the firm had appeared in October and November last year and it never denied those stories till the BJP raised the issue.

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