Cuttack: Union law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Sunday expected that Chief Justice of Orissa High Court Justice Vineet Saran would ensure disposal of 10-year-old cases.

"This is what I expect from you (judges). I am running a campaign - Nyaya Mitra - across the country for the purpose," Prasad said.

The Union law minister said this on the occasion of the foundation stone-laying ceremony of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) building here. Chief Justice of Orissa High Court Justice Vineet Saran was present in the dais along with Chief Justice of India Justice Dipak Misra.

Official sources say that more than three lakh cases are pending in subordinate courts across Odisha, while around 1.68 lakh of them are in Orissa High Court. Of them, at least 10 per cent are more than 10 years old.

Prasad launched the scheme from Bihar in April. The scheme aims to address the problem of pending cases at various courts and aims to reduce it across selected districts, with a special focus on those pending for more than 10 years.

After Bihar the plan is to launch the scheme in the northeast, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Odisha, Gujarat and Bengal.

The scheme envisages appointment of a facilitation officer (Nyaya Mitra) in districts where cases are older than 10 years. The facilitation officer can be a retired judicial officer or a retired bureaucrat. Prasad stressed on the need to make litigants' access to justice affordable. In his speech, Prasad expressed satisfaction at the functioning of the ITATs.

"Confirmation of around 66 per cent of the views of the ITAT in the high courts indicated the adjudicating capacity of the ITAT," he said.

Suresh Chandra, Union law secretary, said of the 686 cases disposed by the ITAT since 2001, high courts have upheld 456 of them.

The pendency of the ITAT had gone down to one lakh in 2015-16 from more than three lakh in 1998-99. As on November 1, 2017, the total pendency is 90,265, Chandra said.