If you have been forced to wait for ages to have your case attended to at the Family Court, don’t be surprised. With only two judges to hear cases at the Family Court Bench, already overburdened with diverse cases, Family Court appeals are being left unattended. As a result, not a single Family Court matter has been disposed in more than two weeks, much to the chagrin of people.

Although the central government has approved of 49 judges for the AP High Court, there are only 30 judges currently managing the show. And with nearly 2 crore cases pending in different categories across the state, the High Court needs at least 64 judges, say senior advocates.

Not too long ago, a group of people from Save Andhra Husbands, had alleged that two judges had adopted a hand-in-glove policy to collude with some lawyers and only dispose their cases. However, advocates chose to refute these claims saying that no two numbered appeals are being handled by one single lawyer. “The Writ Petitions mostly deal with service matters and are of pressing nature, which in a way, force the judges to take them up immediately,” says advocate P. Subhash of the AP High Court.

Advocates however, say that appeals where the woman is the aggrieved party and has filed for maintenance or has challenged the decision of the lower court for a divorce are taken up without much delay but where the husbands want a divorce, the hearing is often postponed in an attempt to give the estranged couples more time for a possible reconciliation.

“Family matters are quite sensitive and granting a divorce requires a lot of thinking and consideration. Therefore the court takes time to ponder and look into the logistics of the case before granting a legal separation by way of a divorce,” says Rao.

As a result of this acute shortage, the Division Bench, formerly meant to deal exclusively with Family Court appeals, has now been burdened with the responsibility of hearing Civil Miscellaneous appeals, Writ Petitions and Writ appeals. And in contrast to Civil Miscellaneous Appeals and Family Court Appeals, that are presented at the High Court to challenge a lower court’s decision, the Writ Petitions and Writ Appeals are admitted for hearing first at the High Court.

“The nature of the Writ Petitions and Appeals are so important that often the Family Court matters tend to get pushed back further,” says Nageshwar Rao, secretary of the AP High Court Bar Association.

On November 25, 194 cases were heard by the Bench headed by Prakash Rao while on November 26, 189 cases were heard. The following day, November 27, as many as 129 cases were heard in the three-hour-forenoon session concluding at 1.30 pm with another six cases being heard in the post-lunch session. Yet, not a single Family Court Appeal has been heard for more than a week. A staggering 177 cases had been listed to be heard on November 30, with not a single representation from the Family Court.