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Introduction With the number of pending cases on the rise, and the ratio of judges to the number of cases not on the verge of any increase any time soon, it is not a long haul to say that the condition of the Indian judiciary is in a pitiable state with respect to the strength of judges. Yet natural justice prescribes the availability of speedy justice to everyone. When one door is jammed, one has to make way for another alternative exit, and such alternative in this scenario would be the introduction of a separate method of Court annexed ADR mechanism in the country. Therefore, the introduction of section 891 and Rules 1A, 1B and 1C in Order 10, which provides for settlement of disputes through ADR mechanism, in the CPC2. Section 89- Is it the best answer? A simple reading of the section suggests that the Court is not bound to decide each case itself, but can refer the dispute to Arbitration, Conciliation, Mediation, Lok Adalats or Judicial settlement mechanism, the failure of which would revert the case back to the Court for normal adjudication proceedings. This could reduce the burden of the Court. But there have been several doubts, even cases challenging the validity and the completeness of S.89, saying that it does not provide much operational value in real time.

1 Civil Procedure Code, Section 89: Settlement of disputes outside the court. - (1) Where it appears to the Court that there exist elements of a settlement which may be acceptable to the parties, the Court shall formulate the terms of settlement and give them to the parties for their observations and after receiving the observations of the parties, the Court may reformulate the terms of a possible settlement and refer the same for - (a) arbitration; (b) conciliation; (c) judicial settlement including settlement through Lok Adalat; or (d) mediation. (2) where a dispute has been