Supreme Court Mandates High Courts’ Oversight as 8.8 Lakh Execution Petitions Languish

In a sweeping intervention aimed at revitalising the enforcement phase of litigation, the Supreme Court has asked all High Courts to institute robust monitoring systems and administrative accountability after finding more than 8,82,000 execution petitions pending nationwide.

"After the decree is passed, if it is going to take years and years to execute it, then it makes no sense and would be nothing short of travesty of justice," a bench of Justices J B Pardiwala and Pankaj Mithal said.

On 16 October 2025, the apex court scrutinised compliance with an earlier direction (issued in March 2025) that required High Courts to collect district-level statistics and ensure disposal of execution petitions within six months. The fresh data demonstrated that though approximately 3.38 lakh petitions had been resolved since the first order, the backlog remainsed “highly disappointing” and “alarming”.

In March, the Supreme Court had said once the data is collected by each of the High Courts, the High Courts shall thereafter proceed to issue an administrative order or circular, directing their respective district judiciary to ensure that the execution petitions pending in various courts shall be decided and disposed of within a period of six months without fail otherwise the concerned presiding officer would be answerable to the High Court on its administrative side.

Once the entire data along with the figures of pendency and disposal thereafter, is collected by all the High Courts, the same shall be forwarded to the Registry of this Court with individual reports, the court had then ordered.

Of all the High Courts, the bench found, unfortunately, the High Court of Karnataka had failed to furnish the court with the necessary data in this regard.

To address this, court directed its Registry to once again give a reminder to the High Court of Karnataka to furnish the necessary data as regards the disposal of the execution petitions in last six months and the pendency of it as on date.

''The Registrar General of the High Court of Karnataka owes an explanation why he has failed to provide us with the necessary information. Two weeks’ time is granted to the Registrar General of the High Court to offer his explanation in this regard,'' the bench said.

Court granted further six months to all the High Courts to follow up with their respective District judiciary as regards the disposal of the execution petitions.

Court posted the matter to report further progress on April 10, 2026.

''We want complete figures from all the High Courts as regards the status of execution petitions the way they have forwarded. When this matter is notified once again on 10-4-2026, we want all the High Courts on their original side also to furnish the necessary information as regards the pending execution petitions as well as disposal of the same. Registry shall forward one copy each of this order to all the High Courts,'' the bench ordered.

Case Title: Periyammal (Dead) through LRs & Ors. vs. V. Rajamani & Anr. Etc

Order Date: October 16, 2025

Bench: Justices J B Pardiwala and Pankaj Mithal