In 1972
Bobby Fisher took over title from Boris Spassky to become the World Champion
and in the same year he played three games against the Greenblatt Program and
massacred the computer. In his comments on the games, Bobby said that the
computer was very weak and that he could give it great odds and still beat it. In
1989 IBM took up the challenge and build up a computer chip ‘Deep Thought’,
which evolved to ‘Deep Blue’, ‘Deep Blue Jr.’, ‘Big Blue’ and finally ‘Deep
Thought II’ as it continued to play against grand masters over and over again.
In 1997 Garry Kasparov
was hunched over a chessboard, visibly frustrated. He was fidgeting in between
turns and shaking his head in disbelief as he waited for his opponent to put
the final touches on an inevitable victory. Finally, Kasparov made his move, stood
up and raced away from the board. He raised his arms, astounded that he was
beaten by a machine. His opponent was the IBM supercomputer, a machine that was
capable of imagining an average of 200 million positions per second. Going into
the match Kasparov was confident, he was the Michael Jordan of chess. He had
been beating chess-playing computers and was considered nearly unbeatable.
When Kasparov, one of the greatest
chess players of all times, lost to a computer in front of a global audience, Artificial
Intelligence was out and open and the time had begun when machines were ready
to surpass humans in processing data and accurately displaying results, based
thereon. The computer continued to use the logic of the grand-masters in
arriving at the result and using the final result as new information. By that
process the computer reached at a more refined inference and was able to infer
at much quicker pace, though it lacked originality or a new idea with which it
could experiment, which faculty is unique to human beings.
The real purpose of AI was and will
always be to help homo sapiens to evolve further as better human beings.
The direction of human evolution and all institutions evolved by him including
law, is to create a harmonized, conflict free civil society without
exploitation and corruption and to provide compensation where ever there is
misuse of power, will has been suppressed, injury has been caused and damage has
been done.
A chess
board has 64 squares, 32 black and 32 white and has 32 players on the board, 16
black and 16 white. Move of every player on the board is defined by rules of
the games. The entire game is about placing of each player strategically to
checkmate the opponents’ king. With every move the position of the board changes
and that leads to making a new move by the opponent. Over the years, 1972 to
1997, the computer continued to absorb the moves of the grand-masters with whom it
played and processed the next best move based on the logic of the location of
the players on the chess board, by the grand-masters. The next best placement evolved
by looking at the moved played by the opponent, the position of the entire board
i.e. the placement of all the players on the board on black and white squares and
the possible and likely moves that may be made in future. The next move was the
result derived from the sum total of all the positions and moves played by all
the grand-masters against it all these years.
In every litigation there are a certain set of facts
existing prior to the filing of Suit or FIR. There are about 1250 Central Acts
and about the same number in each State and Union Territory, more are enacted and
amendments are brought about to the existing enactments regularly. There are
Rules, Regulations, Notifications, Memorandums and Government Orders (‘Statutes’)
existing and issued almost every day. Supreme Court has in it’s about 50,500
judgments (1950 till date) considered more than 4,000 of such statues and other
notifications etc. having force of law. There are about 10 lakh judgments
delivered by High Court all over the country and have interpreted a large
number of statues and notifications etc. as and when any issue arose before it.
This is like the setting of a chess board. The
parties and their advocates strategically apply statutes and judgments to the
facts of their case and by a process of dialectics make all out efforts to get
justice in their favour. Unlike chess where the winner is decided by
checkmating the opponents’ king, in litigation the Judge decides the winner as
he reaches to truth and justice by a process of logic and reasoning based on
his perception and experience. In every case the judge has to give grounds for
his judgment and hold one party as winner and other as looser on the basis of
the information, understanding and appreciation of the facts stated in
documents and pleadings, relevant statutes and judgments and his insight into socio
economic milieu. He has to compensate the person who has been wronged in civil
cases and punish the guilt in criminal cases.
The documents and pleadings in every case are
unique to itself. No two faces are same and no two cases are same, they may be
similar or even twins. That makes law different from chess. The society is
dynamic and evolving and so are statutes and abrasions. Statues are enacted to
deal with abrasions or to regulate the social relationship to restrain abuse,
exploitation and corruption. When Kasparov
was beaten the computers’ were capable of making 200 million calculation per
second and had limited storage capacity. Today they can make up to 10,000
billion calculations per second and have unlimited storage capacity, everything
is on the cloud.
Application of AI to legal institutions is irreversible
and unalterable process of evolution and we will have to adopt the same sooner or
later. The sooner we accept the change, earlier we will be able to evolve
further. It is the most meaningful and phenomenal change for which we have been
waiting for a long time, to wipe out every tear from every eye, by bringing
justice to all. Once an authentic data on uniform parameters of all the
judgments of Supreme Court and High Court, relevant Statutes, pleading and
documents therein is created, AI application can provide the following help to all
the stake holders, which will continue to become more meaningful and
significant as it will be made more and
more applicable:
1. Benefit to litigants:
a. It will
be possible to read and cull out relevant data from any number of documents and
sorting them on the basis of dates and also on relevance. Once the appropriate
data is extracted out of the documents, the facts and events can be arranged in
strict chronology. On the basis of the information thus extracted, further help
can received in drawing out a list of dates and events. In most cases the facts
and events are not disputed, in Singapore the advocates have to draw a common
list of dates and events. What is in dispute is the understanding, interpretation
and the reason behind the event.
b. After analyzing the dates and events and the existing database of judgments and statutes, the
application can display the breaches committed by the parties and the rights of
the parties which have been violated.
c. Once
the terms and conditions of contract that have been breached are determined or
the provisions of statues that have been violated becomes available, the
application can provide the list of judgments that will support the case.
d. Finally
it will also be possible to determine
i. the possible time consumed in reaching to the end of litigation
ii. the cost of litigation
iii. whether it will be meaningful to take up the litigation or not
2. Benefits to Advocates:
a. Drafting
of Deeds, Wills, MoU, Agreements are already in vogue. But it is difficult to
lay your hands on formats which are tailor made for the purpose. AI application
can help in reaching to a more authenticated format to be used.
b. Authenticated
translation of documents from local languages to English, particularly at the
High Court and Supreme Court level still continues to be serious issue. As the
database of documents, pleadings, submissions and judgments continue to grow in
both vernacular and English Language, more authenticated translations can be made
available at a much quicker pace.
c. Use of AI
application will certainly improve the quality of pleadings by eliminating grammatical
mistakes and using legal language, spell check is already available. Once a true
and correct list of dates and events and pleadings is ready, the next step will
be to help in preparing:
i. Issues
ii. Question of law
iii. Grounds in support of the
pleadings
d. Once the
pleadings are completed AI application can help in matching them with the oral
evidence that come on record.
e. After the
pleading and evidence is completed, the application can help in framing of submissions.
f. Finally
the application can provide for relevant judgments in support and against the
submissions.
g. Based on the entire litigation material the application can also
evaluates the pros and cons of the submissions and then assigns a score for
each submission
h. AI can
radically make legal research much easier. The humongous redundant results by word search and search within search
can be minimized. Advocates always need precise and only the most relevant judgments
to be made applicable to the case in hand as precedents. Judgments can be
recommended for the specific facts and submissions of the case, which fits
their need.
i. Once the
parameters for appointment of senior advocates and judges of High Court are objectively
defined, it will be possible for those who wish to make that stream, as their
life objective to follow the parameters and reach his/ her avowed ambition for
which s/he is willing to work with humility, determination and perseverance.
j. At the
time of elevation of an advocate as judge, it will be possible for her/ him to
follow well defined path and be aware of the others in the field, whom s/he
will face for appointment as Chief Justice of High Court, judge of Supreme
Court of India and Chief Justice of India. A substantial amount of prejudices
and preferences will be effectively eliminated.
3. Benefits to Judges (at all level):
a. Make the understanding of facts
simpler and easier
b. Provide options in analyzing the
facts and decision making process
c. Provide options for granting
punishment to accused and compensation to victim in criminal cases
d. Provide options for granting of
relief, compensation, damages and costs in civil cases
e. Help in usage of better language
and usage of right words and terms
f. Improve writing
of judgments by providing the ground and judgments which supports the final
view taken
g. Identify tonal nuances of the
judgement being written and help making them neutral and objective.
h. Bring about content quality and consistency
4. Benefit in appointment of High
Court Judges, Chief Justice of High Court, Judges to Supreme Court and Chief
Justice of India:
a. Once the
data on the performance of each advocate in each case from the inception of
her/his career, becomes available on objective parameters, it will be possible
to pick up the best talent from the bar for appointment as judge of High Court.
AI will be able to retrieve the following data for each advocate:
i. Petitions
and Counters drafted – Subject and issue wise
ii. Admission
matters argued – subject and issue wise, including time spent on legs
iii. Final
hearing matters argued – subject and issue wise, including time spent on legs
iv. Written
Submissions submitted in court or Propositions of law propounded
v. Articles
and books published
vi. Presentations
and Addresses delivered in national and
international conferences
vii. Judges
can continue to enter and mark conduct and performance of each advocate in case
in which they consider it noteworthy on the parameters like presentation, dignity
while addressing, pitch and tone of voice, mannerism, gestures etc.
b. Once a
person is appointed as a Judge of the High Court, report on her/his performance
can be objectively retrieved from the proceedings, orders and judgments
delivered. Analysis of every Judge can be made by using multivariate regression
method of her/his as a single puisne judge, puisne judge along with a senior
judge and as presiding puisne judge. Some of the parameters can be:
i. Proceedings
issued
ii. Orders
delivered - subject and issue wise, including time taken
iii. Judgments
delivered - subject and issue wise
iv. Appeals
and Special Leave Petitions filed against orders and judgments delivered
v. Orders
and judgments confirmed and set aside by Supreme Court
vi. Judgments
of Supreme Court, High Court and other courts referred, considered, analysed,
explained, applied, distinguished and held obiter etc. in the judgments delivered
vii. Ratio
between proceedings, orders, signatory and judgments delivered
c. Propositions of
law propounded in judgments
An algorithms can be developed to
use the above data and identify the perceptions of the judge and her/his
proficiency in bringing justice to the litigant. It will also be possible to identify
inconsistencies in judgments in respect to a particular issue arising in a subject.
This data can be used meaningfully for the purposes of her/his elevation as
Chief Justice of the High Court and elevation as Judge of the Supreme Court.
5. Benefit to Legislature and
Executive:
a. There are three basic reasons for
a litigation:
i. The statute is invalid,
ii. The statute is valid but the
action is invalid,
iii. The person has taken some
advantage by violating a provision of statue or breached a term and condition
and does not wish to compensate back to the state or the person from whom the
benefit have been taken by him.
b. Normally 50% of litigation is
civil and 50 % is criminal and in civil cases 85% are those in which Government
is a party. Out of the 3.3 Crore pending litigation, an AI application can be run on
the about 1.40 Crore Civil litigation in which Government is a party, to determine
under which of the three heads the case is falling.
c. If the Legislature understands
and realizes that the litigants have approached the court because the statute
is invalid in view of law laid down by Supreme Court, they can make amendments
to the Statute and that will lead to disposal of all those cases. If the
Legislature still persists on continuing with the litigation, the Court must
burden the legislature with heavy costs
d. If the Executive understands and
realizes that the litigants have approached the court because the statute is
valid, but the action taken by them is invalid, the executive can retrieve the
order and get the cases disposed of. If the executive still persists on
continuing with the litigation, the Court must burden the Executive with heavy
costs.
e. If the analysis is that the
person has taken some advantage by violating a provision of statue or breached
a term and condition of the contract and does not wish to compensate back to the
state or the person from whom the benefit has been received and is using the
process of court to stall such recovery. The court should give him an option to
withdraw the litigation and pay back the advantage received by him. If the litigant
still persists on continuing with the litigation, the Court must burden with
heavy costs.
f. A mature AI application can over
the years help the legislature and executive in ascertaining the validity of a
statue or action at the time of its enactment or passing of the order and the
possible impact it will make on the exiting judgments and statutes.
All this can dramatically
reduce the mechanical work of the Advocates and Judges and make their
contribution to justice more meaningful and purposeful. They can take time in
thinking more than what is already made available by the machine. However, AI will never ever
replace the ingenuity of an advocate and experience of a Judge and that will be
the real test of her/ his value worth as a lawman, to think out of box which is
working with her/ him shoulder to shoulder.
The final vision of application of AI to legal
Institutions is that before entering into litigation, the person should be
aware of his coming karmas. Before filing the case and during the
process advocates are able to put their best foot forward. Before passing an
order or delivering a judgment, the same could be thoroughly examined. Finally
as soon as a statute is enacted or a judgment is delivered, it must be possible
to objectively say “This is Law! This is Justice!” or “Is this a Law?
Is this Justice?” This will be the true application of Artificial
Intelligence to the legal institutions, not just creating some meta-tags to
help retrieval of judgments on subject and issue, which application has now
become ancient.
Aruneshwar
Gupta
Senior
Advocate, Supreme Court
22.06.2020
