भाग चार-क, असा. क्रमांक ५१, HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY, NOTIFICATION, No. Rule/P. 1603/Notification No. 11/2025. Friday, 10th October 2025.

RNI No. MAHBIL /2009/35527

महाराष्ट्र शासन राजपत्र

असाधारण भाग चार-क

वर्ष ११, अंक ३३] शुक्रवार, ऑक्टोबर १०, २०२५/आश्विवन १८, शके १९४७ [पृष्टठे १३, किंकंमत : रुपये ९.००

असाधारण क्रमांक ५१

प्ाकिंधकृत प्काशन

महाराष्ट्र शासनाव्येकिंतररक्त इतर वैधाकिंनक प्ाकिंधकाऱ्येांनी तयेार केलेले

(भाग एक, एक-अ व एक-ल येांमध्ये प्किंसद्ध केलेले वैधाकिंनक किंनयेम व आदेश येांव्येकिंतररक्त इतर)

वैधाकिंनक किंनयेम व आदेश; येात भारत सरकार, उच्च न्येायेालये, पोलीस आयेुक्त, आयेुक्त (राज्ये उत्पादन शुल्क),

किंजल्हादंडाकिंधकारी व किंनवडणूक आयेोग, किंनवडणूक न्येायेाकिंधकरण, किंनवडणूक किंनणषये अकिंधकारी व किंनवडणूक आयेोगाखालील

इतर प्ाकिंधकारी येांनी तयेार केलेले वैधाकिंनक किंनयेम व आदेश येांचा समावेश होतो.

HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY

APPELLATE SIDE

NOTIFICATION

No. Rule/P.1603/ Notification No.11/2025 .—In exercise of the powers conferred under Article 225 and 227 of the Constitution of India and all other enabling powers in that behalf and with previous approval to the extent necessary under Article 227, 230 and 231 of the constitution of India, the High Court of Bombay hereby makes Rules for Preservation and Destruction of Digitized Records and matter incidental thereto, namely—

Preservation and Destruction of Digitized Records of the Bombay

High Court Rules, 2025.

1. Short Title : These rules may be called the "Preservation and Destruction of Digitised Records of the Bombay High Court Rules, 2025".

2. Commencement : These rules shall come into effect on the date of publication of notification in the Official Gazette.

3. Definitions.

(a) "Agency" means an outsourced agency for carrying out work of scanning and digitization for the High Court ;

(b) "Authorized employee" means an employee, whether in officiating service or hired after retirement, notified by circular issued by the Competent Authority to carry out any of the assigned works or specified tasks in the workflow process of digitization, except second tier verification, locking or unlocking and digitally signing the digitized case record, as final step after verification or giving final go ahead to shred the original physical record or destruction of electronic record ;

(१)

भाग चार-क-५१–१२ महाराष्ट्र शासन राजपत्र असाधारण भाग चार-क, ऑक्टोबर १०, २०२५/आश्विवन १८, शके १९४७ (c) "Competent Authority" means the Registrar General for the Bombay High Court, Registrar Judicial - I, Registrar Judicial-II for Appellate Side, Prothonotary and Senior Master for Original side, Registrar (Judicial) for Bench at Nagpur, Aurangabad, and Bombay High Court at Goa ;

(d) "Case Information" means the data that is stored as case history in the High Court's Case Information System (CIS) which is shown on the official website. This data is used in various case management and tracking automation but may not always form part of the official record of the digitized case record, if accessed by printing on paper or by sharing digitized record divorced from the DARMS or DDRMS ;

(e) "Court Connect" means a system to request for the record and proceedings in connection with any of the cases filed or pending in the High Court. It will be possible for the district and taluka court establishment, either in response or suo-motu, upload or update with record and proceedings of the earlier courts (Trial Court and First Appellate Court). The uploaded or updated earlier Court record and proceedings can be linked to the case or cases filed or pending before the High Court. The record fetched shall satisfy all the norms of digitized record and the Court Connect system shall make available the record available in such manner that it shall be possible for the Court to immediately shift from Main Case or Interim application to earlier Courts record and proceedings ;

(f) "Digitization" means converting analog signal or information in any form into digital that can be understood by computer or electronic devices. In Courts, ordinarily, Digitization as a process involves scanning the documents to create digital images and then indexing, paginating, and equipping them with necessary metadata for efficient ingestion into and retrieval and storage from a Judicial Digital Repository (JDR) maintaining its accessibility and archival standards. For the purposes of these Rules, Digitization also covers and includes all such types of backups, failover systems, disaster recovery arrangements as may be, decided by the High Court, from time to time;

(g) "Digitized Judicial Records" means the process of converting physical court records, including pending case records, disposed case records viz. orders, judgments, decrees, probates, Grants, pleadings, response pleadings, interlocutory and miscellaneous applications, reports, all types of affidavits, office remarks, vakalatnama, presentation forms, praecipe, dockets, earlier court record and proceedings, caveats, court processes, writs, and other documents including translations, into electronic formats ;

(h) "Digitization of Administrative Records of High Court" includes all kinds of Administrative Record, submissions, policy decisions, full house proceedings, minutes of meetings, various orders passed in various administrative capacities, service-related records of Judges of the High Court, Judicial Officers, other officers, and employees of the High Court or working under superintendence and administrative control of the High Court. The term 'Service-related records' covers orders, communications, instructions, notifications, circulars, guidelines, policies, promotion, salary, fixation, leave, disciplinary record, training and other in service or post service events.

(i) "Digitization of other Records of the High Court" includes various Registers, reports, statistics, and returns required to maintained to regulate judicial business or administrative business of the High Court. Besides, it also includes Law reports, books, bare Acts, rules, regulations, schemes, policies, orders, procedures, notifications, circulars, magazines, journals, news items, newspapers etc ;

(j) "Digitised Active Record Management System (DARMS)": means the application software for management of pending cases. The software permits Ingesting new documents as may be filed in an active case (pending cases), from time to time, till such case is disposed finally by the High Court. The DARMS serves as repository to access pending cases records for the Court and Departments/Sections for their cases related judicial business of the Court. Thus, in DARMS it is possible to add documents subsequently after creation of case record or maintain multiple versions of amended pleadings;

(k) "Digitised Disposed Record Management System (DDRMS)": means the application software for management of disposed case records. The software does not permit subsequent changes to the existing case record once disposed case record is created, digitally signed and locked;

(l) "Digital Preservation" means a secure and trustworthy mechanism to ingest, process, store, manage, protect, find, access, and interpret digital information such that the same information can be used at some arbitrary point in the future in spite of obsolescence of everything: hardware, software, processes, format, people ;

(m) "Digital Preservation Standards": means the Judicial Digital Repository infrastructure, High Courts and the JDR management staff should collectively gear up the capacity to comply with international standards and best practices related to digital preservation as under—

(i) ISO 16363 Audit and Certification of Trustworthy Digital Repositories.

(ii) ISO 14721 Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Reference Model.

(iii) ISO 13008 Digital Records Conversion & Migration Process.

(iv) ISO 13028 Implementation Guidelines for Digitization of Records.

(v) ISO 15489 Records Management.

(vi) BS 10008 Evidential Weight & Legal Admissibility of Electronically Stored Information (ESI).

(vii) ISO 27001 Information Security Management ;

(n) "Electronic Record" shall have the same meaning as in clause (t) of sub-section (1) of Section 2 of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (21 of 2000);

(o) "High Court" means the Bombay High Court ;

(p) "ISO" means the International Organization for Standardization, which co-ordinates national standards bodies worldwide ;

(q) ISO 14721:2012 defines the reference model for an open archival information system (OAIS). As suggested by eCommittee, Digital Preservation. Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) (Para 2 on Page 11) Specially designed Judicial Digital Preservation System (JDPS) and Access Portal developed as per the ISO 14721 Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Reference Model should be used for preservation, search and retrieval, which is necessary for obtaining ISO 16363 certification.

(r) Judicial Digital Repositories (JDR) : means the SOP of the eCommittee plans to establish dedicated Judicial Digital Repositories (JDRs) at the High Court level to manage and preserve the digital records of the High Court as well as the district courts under its administrative control. Judicial Digital Repository (JDR) will enable the High Court in effective management and consolidation of digital information / digital records (born digital and digitized both) with proper accountability;

(s) "Local Area Network" means a computer network that interconnects computers in a limited area such as a home, school, computer laboratory or office building using network media ;

(t) "Microfilm" means Polyester-based silver gelatine type film containing photographic record on reduced scale (1:24) of printed or other graphic matter ;

(u) "Nodal Officer" means an officer, whether officiating in service or specially authorized, if hired after retirement, and notified by circular issued by the Competent Authority to perform any of the assigned works in the workflow process of the digitization which includes verification of second layer, locking and digitally signing the specified digitized case records and, giving final go ahead to shred the original physical record or destruction of electronic record after order of the competent Authority in tune with the Rules ;

(v) "Office report/remarks" means when any new case is filed before the High Court, or any miscellaneous documents including response pleadings are filed before the High Court or when Court passes any order and adjourns the matter seeking compliance before certain time frame or next date, report or remarks of the authorized officer for the purpose of the Court information is uploaded in the Case Information System (CIS) under caption "Officer Report/Remarks". There shall be a provision to replicate such a report to the website of the High Court so that stake holders can view and save such report and update their case files ;

(w) "Open system" means a system that implements sufficient open specifications for interfaces, services, and supporting formats to enable properly engineered image processing applications that can be ported with minimal changes across a wide range of systems, can interoperate with other applications on local and remote systems, and can interact with users in a style that facilitates access and maintenance of digital records on such systems ;

(x) "Open systems environment" means the comprehensive set of interfaces, services, and supporting formats, plus user aspects for portability or interoperability of applications, data, or users, as specified in information technology standards and profiles set by Open Systems ;

(y) "Repository" means a central place where digital information / digital record is consolidated, stored, managed, maintained, and preserved which can be identified by place of data center or url or ip address ;

(z) "Trusted Judicial Digital Repository" means and includes judicial digital repositories for the High Court established under eCourts Project (Phase III) which are duly certified as per ISO 16363 along with supporting ecosystem for long term digital preservation of Judicial records.

4. Preservation and destruction of physical and Digitised record :—

(1) The Judicial, Administrative and Other record, be it physical or Digitised, shall be preserved according to the Bombay High Court (Original Side) Rules, 1980 (Appendix III, Rules framed by the High Court of Judicature at Bombay under section 3 of the Destruction of Records Act, 1917 (5 of 1917) in regard to the records of the offices on Original Side of the High Court) and the Bombay High Court Appellate Side Rules, 1960 (Chapter XV, Destruction of Records).

(2) When Judicial Digital Repositories (JDR) of the High Court are set up under eCourts Project as per Digital Preservation: Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) eCommittee Supreme Court of India and are certified as ' Trusted Judicial Digital Repositories'; the Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court shall have power to regulate, notwithstanding the period of preservation prescribed in the Rules mentioned in sub rule (1), destruction of physical record after the digitized record is properly ingested in Trusted Judicial Digital Repositories. The digitized documents shall further be used for audit purpose as per Section 7A of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (21 of 2000) ;

Provided that, notwithstanding the decision to destroy physical record after ingesting digitized record to the trusted judicial repositories, the Chief Justice of the High Court shall have power to take a decision to preserve such earmarked physical record of Historical significance by adopting any of the techniques of preservation mentioned in sub-rule (3) or sub-rule (4) of this rule.

(3) The High Court, being one of the Chartered High Courts, shall also undertake curative work for preserving posterity of ascertaining and earmarked record of Historical significance by making use of aqueous deacidification technique. Similarly, the High Court shall also undertake restorative conservation by making use of one of the techniques which includes tissue repairing, full pasting, lamination, docketing and binding etc.

(4) The High Court, in addition to the above preservation measures mentioned in sub-rules (2) and (3), may adopt duplicative measures like reprography using microfilms and its further conversion of analog microfilms to digital images.

5. Digitization Specifications :—Digitization specifications are provided by eCommittee, Supreme Court of India under Digital Preservation: Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) (Page 49 paragraph 11.5.1 to 11.5.3). The very specifications are accepted as standard specification for digitization.

6. Verification of Digitized record :—The designated Nodal officer(s) of the court or Department/Section should verify each digitized record by comparing it against the original document as per following parameters (as applicable) and store the information in a database.

7. Untying pending physical case files and preparing :—Pending case files shall be untied and opened by an employee engaged by the Agency under the supervision of authorized employee of the Bombay High Court. The documents and pages in the files shall be arranged such that pleadings, farad sheet and orders, office reports, office documents and interim applications shall be separated. If there are interim or Miscellaneous applications those shall be separated from the main file. As per currently maintained case type master in CIS, Interim Applications or Miscellaneous applications are separate case types and as such have separate CNR Numbers. Each CNR number requires separately entered hence main case and interim applications are to be entered.

8. Scanning, Quality Control and OCR :—(1) Standard file formats and compression methods : Any image processing system used for creating digitised Judicial records shall support file formats and compression methods that are employed and actively supported by the information technology industry, and that allow for the interchange of documents with other systems. Examples of such formats include single page Tagged Image File Format (TIFF) with CCITT Group III and/or IV compression, Portable Network Format (PNG) for grayscale or colour images or black and white scale, PDF/A (especially for long-term retention (10 years or more), and Open Document Architecture/ Open Document Interchange Format (ODA/ODIF) for text.

(2) Image processing systems shall meet an established open system standard architecture, and shall run on hardware, operating systems, and networking systems that are supported on an ongoing basis by the information technology industry.

(3) Computer enhancement or removal of scanner-created borders or black areas which are not present on the original document shall be permitted in an image processing system used for keeping digitised judicial records, provided such manual or automatic computer-enhancement processes and procedures used while scanning documents shall be thoroughly documented for proof of authenticity of the records maintained on the imaging system.

(4) For best recognition results in Optical Character Recognition (OCR), use a dpi (dots per inch) between 200 and 300 dpi. 200 dpi is a minimum dpi for text that is 10 point or larger. If the text is 9 point or smaller, the dpi would need to be higher. Languages that have small intricate characters use minimum 300 dpi for 10-point text.

(5) Production of searchable PDF/A document requires OCR to be performed on digitized images containing printed text. The documents in regional languages will require regional language OCR supported with properly trained data for good results.

(6) To ensure the integrity, accuracy, and reliability of the judicial records contained in image processing systems, such systems shall create and retain a record of the location, date, operator, agency, and equipment involved in the production of all images it copies or produces.

9. Method of keeping digitized records in DARMS :—(1) Pending case record shall be separately maintained in four different compartments e.g.

(a) Pleadings and annexures, response pleadings of the main case.

(b) Record of proceedings (ROP) (farad sheet).

(c) Office remarks and submissions.

(d) Other documents viz. processes, challans, warrants, communications, and other miscellaneous documents.

भाग चार-क-५१–२६ महाराष्ट्र शासन राजपत्र असाधारण भाग चार-क, ऑक्टोबर १०, २०२५/आश्विवन १८, शके १९४७ (2) Pagination of each compartment shall start in chronological order afresh. Linkages between Interim applications and main case shall be maintained in DARMS so that while accessing either the main case or interim application, such linkage is conspicuously visible to the user and immediate shift from main case to interim application and vice versa is possible.

(3) Besides pagination in chronological order, Record of Proceedings and office remarks shall bear relevant date to access the record. Pagination of pleadings shall match pagination available on physical record. In the event pagination on physical record is incorrect or erroneous, the Nodal officer shall correct the same before digitizing the physical case record.

(4) Meta data from the Case Information System (CIS) shall be fetched before proceeding with the digitization of any case record. The blank or semi filled data elements and data fields can be updated in DARMS.

(5) Where there are repeated page numbers in any of the case files, it may be handled with suffix numbers. (e.g. Say page number 34 is repeated two times in such case first page number 34 can be maintained, the pagination of repeated entry can be corrected as 34.1 and likewise.)

(6) Where there are missing page numbers in any of the case files, it may be handled by inserting blank page which should contain a text that the page has been added to adjust the page number and has been inserted to adjust the missing page number.

(7) Index at the beginning of pleadings available in physical documents shall match with bookmarking and pagination entered in DARMS. Whereas Index of Record of Proceedings (farad sheet) and Officer report/remarks shall be auto-built as and when entries with documents are made in the Case Information System (CIS) and fetched in DARMS.

(8) Orders and Judgements passed by the Court, office reports or remarks, shall be fetched from Case Information System (CIS) with all meta data. When the farad sheet contains manually written orders or when order is not available for fetching in CIS but exists in physical case record, only in such cases order should be scanned and updated.

10. Roles, responsibilities, workflow process and work apportionment :

(1) Name of the Agency and human resources engaged by the agency shall need to be entered in DARMS and DDRMS along with all the details with device and roles assigned to each user engaged by the Agency.

(2) Names, designation, departments or sections, original side, appellate side, bench, email of the authorized employees shall be entered in DARMS and DDRMS.

(3) The process shall start by sending requisitions from various Departments by making bundle entries of the cases. Authorised employees of each Department and each Section shall create bundle with priority tag (e.g. listed or to be listed before abc court on .....date). The Nodal officer of the Department shall ensure that physical bundles are matching with the virtual bundles created in DARMS or DDRMS. Each bundle shall not contain more than 10 files.

(4) The bundles shall be transported by proper conveyance to scanning and digitization centre where each bundle along with cases mentioned in the bundles will be physically verified and only after verification bundles shall be received and receipt shall be acknowledged to the Department or Section.

(5) Physical Case File preparation shall be untied, and papers shall be arranged by employee of the agency under supervision of the authorised employee.

(6) Scanning, Cleaning, de-skewing, quality check, and OCR enablement shall be performed by the human resources engaged by the agency and the work so performed shall be verified by the authorised employee after comparison with the physical file. A care should be taken that OCR of documents in regional languages is performed by selecting dictionaries of language in which document appears. If any document is in multiple languages in such cases OCR may be completed in multiple languages one by one.

(7) Scanning completed physical files shall be immediately stitched as per customary practice and it shall be ensured that the files are made available for verification on completion of the bookmarking. The papers shall be arranged under the supervision of the authorised employee by human resources engaged by the agency. Authorised employee shall verify and shall make initial on the stitched physical file towards verification along with date and time.

(8) The verified files shall be ingested for the bookmarking. The work of bookmarking along with necessary meta data shall be performed by the manpower engaged by the Agency as per the guidelines and rules.

(9) The first layer of verification shall be performed by the authorised employees who are specifically assigned with the work by comparing with the physical files. It shall be mandatory to verify all IAs bookmarked along with main case file. In the event of defect, the file may be returned along with remarks of defect and expected corrections to verify the file.

(10) The second layer of verification shall be performed by Nodal. Officer specifically assigned with case files as per allocation orders. If there are any corrections, the files can be returned with remarks. If everything is found satisfactory, the file shall be digitally signed by the Nodal Officer and locked for further corrections. Identical process may be followed for interim applications so bookmarked.

(11) After completion of verification of digitised case records, physical files shall be arranged in identical bundles by the human resources engaged by the agency and dispatched through DARMS or DDRMS to the user or Section or Department which initiated requisition to digitise by creating bundle. At the same time the agency shall ensure that physical bundles whereon bundle number is conspicuously mentioned are immediately returned by appropriate conveyance to user or Section or Department.

(12) The requisition initiator user or Section or Department, on receipt of delivery of bundles, shall physically verify receipt of each case shown in the bundle. After such verification the user or Section or Department shall receive and acknowledge receipt of bundle to the agency in Scanning and Digitization Centre.

(13) While sending requisition by creating bundles or dispatching bundles in physical form, details of the conveyor may be updated, as far as possible.

11. Duty to send requisition, monitor, follow up and obtain custody of physical cases

send for digitization :—

(1) It shall be the duty of Authorized employees and the concerned Nodal Officer of the Department or Section to send requisition for digitization well in advance before the case is listed before the Court.

(2) Authorized employees and Nodal Officer of the Section shall monitor progress of the case files for which requisition for digitization was sent in advance. They shall follow up and coordinate with the human resources of the agency or manager to ensure that entire cause list for a day is ready 48 hours advance.

(3) While creating bundle only main cases shall be calculated to count 10 number of cases to complete maximum number cases which can be included in the bundle. Whenever any main case consists interim applications, such interim applications shall form part of the supplementary bundle wherein authorized employees and Nodal officers shall take every care mark all such interim applications which are being sent along with the main case.

(4) When any case is already forwarded to scanning and digitization centre and any new documents is filed in such case, authorized employee or Nodal officer shall create supplementary bundle immediately so that the documents subsequently filed gets merged with the file already sent. However, care should be taken that supplementary bundle for subsequently filed documents shall not be attempted 16 hours before the date of the cause list. At the same it may be necessary to inform parties and litigants to file documents or response 24 hours before the date of the listing any case before the Court.

भाग चार-क-५१–३८ महाराष्ट्र शासन राजपत्र असाधारण भाग चार-क, ऑक्टोबर १०, २०२५/आश्विवन १८, शके १९४७ (5) In any case, authorized employees and Nodal Officer of the Section shall ensure that bundles consisting of cases forming part of the cause list are completed before deadline and are returned by the Agency through in similar bundles through DARMS and conveyed physically with identical bundles. This is necessary to ensure that cases forming part of the cause list are ready to dispatch for labai or are ready for arranging cause list to the concerned Court.

(6) No Authorized employee or Nodal Officer shall insist for return of loose physical case files without bundle and nor shall send any conveyor to pick such files from the scanning and digitization centre either with or without consent of the Manager of the agency. To avoid such emergency events, a care shall be taken to send bundles well in advance and by proper monitoring and follow up they shall ensure delivery of bundles well within desired date and time. Only in rarest of rare case, one or two files can be requested to be returned on written recommendation of the Competent Authority of the concerned section or department. While making such requisition for return of loose files divorced from the bundle, case numbers, Court Number, date, and time of sending bundle, bundle number, date of cause list, time before which files is required shall be mentioned which shall be eligible for return in loose form only on recommendation of the Competent Authority.

12. Shifting the digitized record from DARMS to DDRMS :—

(1) Once any case is disposed of, after expiry of the statutory period of an appeal, the digitized record shall be made accessible to admission branch or final hearing branch of the record room.

(2) If the Decree, Bill of Costs is prepared, and communications is made along with writ of the Court to intimate the parties and/or the executing courts, such Decree, Bill of Costs, communications and writs for execution, either may be fetched from CIS, if already uploaded or the copies of the same may be scanned and uploaded from the physical file available with the Department or Section.

(3) DDRMS shall have a provision to apportion the digitised record.

(4) DDRMS shall have a provision to give alerts to destroy electronic record if the period of preservation has expired. It is possible for the Nodal Officer to seek approval of the Competent Authority by placing such list for consideration.

(5) The electronic record shall not be destroyed unless order to that effect has been passed by the competent Authority and has been uploaded to the DDRMS.

(6) Nodal officer of the record room or decree department shall be authorized to destroy the electronic record only on obtaining approval from the Competent Authority. The Nodal officer of the record room shall first upload the approval along with selected cases on the website and notice board. After giving one month's time for the stakeholders to collect such electronic record, shall proceed to destroy the electronic record.

(7) DDRMS shall not permit destruction of any such digitised record which as per these Rules need to be permanently preserved. DDRMS shall ensure that the date of disposal of any case or date of disposal by the Supreme Court in a case arising out of the order of the High Court is not editable, as from these dates period of preservation is generally reckoned.

13. Method of maintaining digitised record in DDRMS :—

(1) As regards disposed judicial record or administrative record or other record of the Appellate side of the High Court is concerned, it shall be maintained as provided under Chapter XV paragraphs of the Bombay High Court (Appellate Side) Rules, 1960 read with Section 7 of the Information Technology Act, 2000. The record shall be maintained in part A, Part B, Part C and Part D as mentioned in Paragraph 2 of the Chapter XV of the Bombay High Court (Appellate Side) Rules, 1960. Schedule III to these Rules shall reiterate parts (A, B, C and D) under which named documents in the schedule are covered and the preservation period of such named documents is mentioned in the Schedule. The schedule shall consist of three parts, firstमहाराष्ट्र शासन राजपत्र असाधारण भाग चार-क, ऑक्टोबर १०, २०२५/आश्विवन १८, शके १९४७ ९ part shall be for digitised Judicial Record, second part shall be for digitised Administrative Record and third part shall be for the other records.

(2) As regards disposed judicial record or administrative record or other record of the original side of the High Court is concerned, it shall be maintained as provided under APPENDIX II, Rules under the Destruction of Records Act, 1917 (5 of 1917) read with Section 7 of the Information Technology Act, 2000. Schedule IV to these Rules shall reiterate parts (A, B, C and D) under which a named documents in the schedule are covered and the preservation period of such named documents in the Schedule. This Schedule shall consist of three parts the first part shall be for digitised Judicial Record, second part shall be for digitised Administrative Record and third part shall be for the other records.

(3) The Chief Justice of the High Court shall have power to take a decision to apply different parameters of preservation or destruction of the digitised record including period of preservation of such digitised records and or add new items to the list of named documents or change part of existing named document or change preservation years as regards digitised record. The parameters of preservation of the digitized record need not necessarily be identical with the physical record. The Chief Justice shall have power to take a decision to include archived records, journals, books, libraries, newspapers, news items, articles, magazines, in the libraries as part of other records.

14. Procedure to digitise disposed legacy records :—

(1) Legacy record of disposed cases of the High Court preserved in bound volumes of Judgements authored by all the Judges of the High Court may be sent by giving details of the volume through DDRMS for digitisation purposes. Identically if the record relating to Record of Proceedings (Farad orders) is kept in bound volumes (District wise and Date wise) may also be entered in the DDRMS for digitisation purposes. After entry in the DDRMS the safe conveyance with personal attendant may be arranged to convey the record to place of scanning and digitisation of disposed record. In the rainy season special care may be taken while conveying the record to be permanently preserved.

(2) The manager of the agency shall first take a call as to whether it would be wise to open the bound volumes for digitisation purposes. If the papers in the bound volumes are fragile and need delicate handling in such cases book scanners or more suitable scanners may be used to digitise such fragile and delicate record to be permanently preserved.

(3) In the event legacy record of a case does not find trace of any case number and year in the Case Information System (CIS), DDRMS shall generate CNR number of the case for future reference purposes for creating unique digital identity of the said case. All the meta data which otherwise was available for fetching through CIS may be entered, as far as possible, by manual entries while digitising such record.

(4) While cleaning scanned pages a care should be taken that contents of any document are kept intact. OCR may be performed as per the language of the document by selecting suitable dictionaries.

(5) Bookmarking may be performed for Record of Proceeding or Farad Order to map the order with dates and Coram for future accessibility.

(6) In the case of Judgements, besides date and Coram few other details like date of filing, date of registration, type of disposal, advocate who argued the case, subject categories, Acts and Sections etc. may also be entered.

(7) In the case of pleadings, party, or parties on whose behalf the pleadings are filed and advocate representing such parties along with dates may be entered. Process of sending record for digitisation of cases which are not bound in volumes shall be the same as described in Rules 10 and 11 of these Rules.

भाग चार-क-५१–३अ१० महाराष्ट्र शासन राजपत्र असाधारण भाग चार-क, ऑक्टोबर १०, २०२५/आश्विवन १८, शके १९४७ 15. Standards :—The High Court shall endeavour to meet the Digital Preservation Standards under the guidance and assistance from the eCommittee, Supreme Court of India and, as far as possible, stive to reach the benchmarks of different ISO standards, open system, open system environments, Judicial Digital Repositories and Trusted Judicial Repositories.

16. Power to make changes :—

(1) The competent Authorities shall have power to regulate the procedure to be adopted or changes to be made in the procedure in carrying out business of scanning, digitization, preservation, or destruction of digitised records by issuing circulars after obtaining approval from the Chief Justice of the High Court.

(2) The Competent Authority shall have power to regulate the procedure, modes, or pattern of digital preservation of Digitised Administrative Record of the High Court. The Competent Authority shall keep in mind that any change which affects the procedure DARMS, DDRMS, Trusted Judicial Repositories or its fundamental arrangement of documents already regulated in the application or system shall be uniform across the benches including the principal seat of the High Court.

(3) The Competent Authority in the event of requirement of any changes to the DARMS or DDRMS or Trusted Judicial Repositories shall forward request to the Central Project Coordinator who shall place it before the Computer Committee or Scanning and Digitization Committee of the High Court along with remarks and repercussions on the Application or system, if any, seeking approval to such change.

(4) The Applications or systems or standards concerning Scanning and Digitization can be changed or improved or equipped with cutting edge technology, in terms of technological change, only on approval by the Computer Committee or Scanning and Digitization Committee of the High Court and not otherwise.

(5) Any arrangements as to local preservation of digitised records, types of backups, failover systems, disaster recovery arrangements may be approved by Computer Committee or Scanning and Digitization Committee of the High Court, from time to time, and the approval of the Committee shall be placed before the Committee of Administrative Judges of the High Court before moving for budgetary arrangement to the Government.

17. Updating User data from time to time :—

(1) It shall be the duty of the Nodal officer to ensure that all the details of the authorized employees working under supervision and control are up to date in the system along with details of email id of domain "bhc.gov.in", department, section, bench, etc. In the event the authorized employee is assigned with work of specific case types or specific years or specific courts or date in such situation details of such assignment shall be updated in user role allocation.

(2) In the event of transfer or retirement or suspension or removal from the service, the Nodal officer shall disable Department or section access to such authorized employee who has been transferred or retired or suspended or removed from the service.

(3) For making changes relating to assignment which cannot be made at the Nodal Officer level, requisition of such change may be sent to Nodal Officer or authorized employee of the IT Cell of the High Court.

(4) The provisions mentioned in sub-rules (1) to (3) shall apply mutatis mutandis to the Competent Authority in the event of transfer or retirement or suspension or removal from the service of any of the Nodal officer already added as user in the capacity of the Nodal Officer of the High Court.

18. Preparing digitised case record for supplying certified copies :—

(1) DARMS or DDRMS shall be integrated with eCopying Application of the High Court. As such for seeking online certified copies to the stakeholders, bookmarked index in a digitised case record shall be made available before the person seeking certified copy (provided eligible toमहाराष्ट्र शासन राजपत्र असाधारण भाग चार-क, ऑक्टोबर १०, २०२५/आश्विवन १८, शके १९४७ ११ seek such copy). The user shall select required documents out of the available documents. The digitally signed eCertified copies of requisitioned documents shall be sent to the user, or the very copies shall be printed, sealed, and signed by the authorized officer of the Copying section.

(2) When user attempts to seek certified copies in a case of which record is yet to be digitized in DARMS or DDRMS, in such situation, user has been given facility to describe the document along with date. The certified copy section shall forward the request to the Nodal Officer of the Department or Section to which case belongs. The Nodal Officer shall get the case record scanned and bookmarked, verified, and locked then and there in the Department. Once the record is digitally signed and locked, it shall be made available to the Certified Copy Section, whereafter the certified copies of the requisitioned documents may be supplied by following the procedure as per the Rules.

19. Earlier Court Records and Proceedings :—

(1) Each Court establishment of the District and Taluka Courts, Family Courts, Industrial and Labour Courts shall have a login to the 'Court Connect'.

(2) In any case pending or disposed by the High Court, the Nodal officer or authorized employee of the Court, Department or Section may requisition record and proceedings of the earlier Courts (Trial Court and First Appellate Court) by placing request through Court Connect. While sending such requisition, the High Court Nodal Officer or authorized employee shall update District or Taluka Court case number of earlier courts along with timeframe, if any.

(3) On requisition, apart from notification on the portal, email alert shall be sent to the official email account of that Court establishment.

(4) On login to the Court Connect; after receiving email notification, the Nodal officer of the Court Establishment shall be able to see the High Court Case Number as well as earlier Court Case Number in which record and proceedings has been called for. Irrespective of any requisition, it is possible for the Nodal officer of the Court establishment to upload record and proceedings of any case number of own Court establishment in anticipation of such requisition from the High Court (e.g. All Conviction cases and death references). As and when requisition to such case number is made automatically already uploaded record will get attached to such High Court Case Number.

(5) The process of scanning and OCR shall be carried out inhouse and bookmarking may be done in A, B, C and D parts as described in Civil and Criminal Manual. There shall be provision to enter Exhibit number and part of the case record for each Case document record. Whereas roznama may be scanned and uploaded separately by mentioning from date and to date of each scanned pages of roznama. It must be kept in mind that documents containing Marathi text need Marathi language selection for OCR, whereas OCR of documents containing text in English need English OCR which is default language. Documents containing text in both the language requires OCR in English as well as in Marathi language. The software for English, Hindi and Marathi OCR is already supplied to each Court Establishment.

(6) On receipt of the record the Court establishment shall get notification on the portal as well as email alert mentioning to have received such record and proceedings pursuant to the requisition of the High Court.

(7) Once login to the Court establishment through court connect is activated, no original earlier Court Record, whether in disposed or pending case, shall be retained in the High Court.

(8) For any reason, it is not possible to any of the earlier Courts to upload the record and proceedings of trial court and first appellate court, in such cases paper based hard copy of such record and proceedings shall be physically sent to the High Court properly separately in A, B, C and D parts with separate Roznama to the concerned Department or Section of the High Court. The Nodal officer or Authorized employee of the Department or Section shall scan and bookmark and verify the record. Once digitized record is verified, signed and locked by the Nodal officer of the Department or Section of the High Court, immediately thereafter the original record and proceedings may be returned to the Court from where it was sent to the High Court.

(9) While hearing any case, despite availability of digitized record of the earlier courts' record and proceedings, the High Court while hearing a pending matter may decide to pursue original paper based hard copies of the record and proceedings of the earlier Courts, in such cases upon an order passed by the High Court original paper based hard copies of the record and proceedings of the earlier courts shall be called for.

20. Residual Powers : The Chief Justice of the High Court shall have power to issue suitable directions to regulate, streamline implementation of the work of digitization in the High Court including its Benches.

High Court of Judicature at Bombay Appellate Side, Bombay,

Dated 9th October, 2025.

S. C. KHATI, Registrar General.

NOTIFICATION

No. Rule/P.1603/Notification No.23/2025. – In exercise of powers conferred under sub-rule (2) of Rule 1 in respect of Rules for Digitization Viz. "Preservation and Destruction of Digitized Records of the Bombay High Court Rules, 2025", the Hon'ble the Chief Justice appoint 13.10.2025 to be the date from which Rules for Digitization Viz. "Preservation and Destruction of Digitized Records of the Bombay High Court Rules, 2025", shall come into force in the State of Maharashtra.

High Court of Bombay, Dated 9th October, 2025.

S. C. KHATI, Registrar General.

ON BEHALF OF GOVERNMENT PRINTING, STATIONERY AND PUBLICATION, PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY DIRECTOR, RUPENDRA DINESH MORE, PRINTED AT GOVERNMENT CENTRAL PRESS, 21-A, NETAJI SUBHASH ROAD, CHARNI ROAD, MUMBAI 400 004 AND PUBLISHED AT DIRECTORATE OF GOVERNMENT PRINTING, STATIONERY AND PUBLICATIONS, 21-A, NETAJI SUBHASH ROAD, CHARNI ROAD, MUMBAI 400 004. EDITOR : DIRECTOR, RUPENDRA DINESH MORE.