‘Making justice accessible requires a systemic approach beyond formal equality‘

For Sanchita Ain, Advocate-on-Record at the Supreme Court, the struggle for access to justice began with her own right to practise law. 

“I myself have a disability — a chronic neurological condition — and at one point I believed I was unfit for litigation because I could not work the long hours the profession demands,” she said. “What made the difference was accommodation — not sympathy, but institutional accommodation. If systems are not put in place, inclusion depends on individual goodwill.” 

Speaking at Justice Unplugged 2026, a daylong legal conclave, Ms. Ain recounted how she had to repeatedly push the Supreme Court administration to provide a sign language interpreter for Sarah Sunny, a lawyer with hearing disability she represented in September 2023. “She did not need permission for an interpreter. It was her right,” she said, pointing to persistent “court bureaucracy” that forces litigants and lawyers with disabilities to “run from pillar to post”. 

Moderating the discussion, Kunal Shankar, Deputy Business Editor, The Hindu, framed the broader structural question: whether greater representation on the Bench — across gender, caste, disability and other identities — could meaningfully expand access to justice. He noted that empirical studies have repeatedly pointed to the under-representation of marginalised communities in higher judicial appointments, and asked whether reform of the appointments process was integral to improving access. 

Karuna Nundy, Senior Advocate, Supreme Court, responded by turning the focus to diversity within the judiciary. “What is the essential problem with having mostly upper-caste, able-bodied men as judges across the board?” she asked. “Representation is a good in and of itself. It must not be that if you are a woman, or Dalit, or queer person, you must be 10 times more brilliant than the next person to deserve a place.” 

On the collegium system, she argued that structural reform — including forms of reservation — must be seriously debated to address historical exclusion. Speaking about the designation as Senior Advocate, she noted that increased transparency — requiring candidates to disclose constitutional matters argued, pro bono work undertaken and academic contributions — had made the process “that much more objective”, even if discretion and bias can never be entirely eliminated. 

Shreya Arora Mehta, District and Additional Sessions Judge, Delhi, reflected on the evolution of judicial infrastructure and legal aid. “When I joined the judiciary in 2010, judges would hope their courtroom at least had an attached washroom. Our seniors told us they had worked in courtrooms without even proper lighting,” she said, underscoring gradual but uneven improvement. 

On legal aid, she was candid about quality concerns. Recounting an interview with a young lawyer who could not answer basic procedural questions but said he would “learn on the job”, she observed: “You are going to learn at the cost of the deprived. Legal aid is about dignity. We cannot experiment with the cases of the vulnerable.” While India remains a global leader in statutory, court-annexed legal services, she stressed that mentoring and monitoring mechanisms must strengthen quality across the country. 

Dr. Tanya Sebastian of VIT School of Law brought the conversation back to legal education. “Access to justice begins with access to legal education,” she said, highlighting tuition barriers, mental health challenges and questions of gender identity faced by students. Clinical legal education, she added, enables students to engage with communities and treat justice delivery as a systemic problem, not merely a courtroom exercise. 

The session closed with questions from students and lawyers on constitutional morality and accessibility for persons with disabilities. If one theme ran through the discussion, it was that equality before the law is only a starting point. As Ms. Ain put it, “Justice is not just about dispute resolution. It is about creating a structure where every person can participate in all aspects of life with dignity.”