Artificial intelligence in India’s courtrooms

The Hall of Justice operates solely based on pieces of evidence and allows no opportunity for biases in it’s working. However, according to sources, 6% of the convictions are false. A significant reason for this could be the inclinations caused by humans while assessing these attestations. There are a lot of theories which suggest the replacement of human judges by robots.

They are also upheld by the unvarnished truth that machines would make evidence-based verdicts rather than subjective.

On the contrary, several critics challenge the ethicality of Artificially Intelligent robots and believe that its introduction in courtrooms could be disastrous. In this article, I will discuss the applications of AI in the judicial system of India, the proper way of introducing, the shortcomings and the advantages of it.

Currently, the Supreme Court of India is using AI for translating its judgements into several vernacular languages for a mobile app. However, the Chief Justice of India (CJI) SA Bobde is fascinated by AI and believes that it could be of significant use in the judicial system. He thinks AI can prevent the delay in the delivery of justice by working on the repetitive, mathematical and mechanical parts of the judgments. Regardless of the serviceability offered by AI, the CJI made it explicit that AI will not replace human discretion. He claimed that AI can only aid the proceedings but cannot take important decisions. We know that the Indian Government is interested in the deployment of AI in the judiciary, but let us understand how they can be installed in the judiciary of the world’s largest democracy.

How Can AI be Introduced In The Judiciary?

Artificial Intelligence, like in numerous other fields, has made its entry into the courtrooms. The Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions (COMPAS) is a practical example of AI in use.

The criminal judges of some states use COMPAS to predict the defendant’s likelihood to re-offend. COMPAS provides a score from 1 to 10 (lowest to highest risk) to the defendants based on 137 factors like gender, age and past criminal records. However, the accuracy of COMPAS can be questioned as it is prone to machine biases* while dealing with white and black Americans.

Likewise, India can also make extensive use of AI in Judiciary besides merely translating verdicts. One application of AI in the Indian courtrooms could be the replacement of traditional court reporters. These reporters need to hear different types of court proceedings and make their respective transcripts. However, the hectic job leads to typing errors in some transcripts. Advanced voice recognition softwares can write errorfree transcripts very rapidly and save a lot of time in the courtroom.

AI can provide its contribution to the judicial process by playing an advisory role. It can help in assessing the facts and thereby providing a statement for the judge to consider. AI can draw data from previous cases, as mentioned by CJI Bobde and reduce the human task of reading different laws. Emotionally Intelligent robots can be present in the court to report facial expressions and body language of the accused in criminal cases. The judge would still have the power to determine whether to consider the statement or to

deny it altogether.

Why Cannot AI Replace The Judges Entirely?

From the previous example of COMPAS, it can be made ascertain that AI softwares are still not very accurate in passing predetermined judgements. If AI is given the power to pass the final verdict unanimously, many innocent people would be punished, even for a crime that they are unlikely to do. There would be no hope for mercy, as machines will not work on emotions. AI would penalise people based on their past and current records; this would not allow future improvement in an individual’s mindset.

AI programs are computers after all, which work on a given code; this leaves room for immoral manipulations. Now, imagine the severe coif the supreme judicial power and the decision of a person’s life rest with AI softwares. It would be a catastrophe.

Considering the probability that Artificial Intelligence will pose a fundamental threat of autonomy, it needs to have some sort of human intervention. There has to be a system to ensure that the goals of AI coincide with human goals. The idea behind this is to safeguard the final power of decision making with humans.