New Delhi, Aug 28 (PTI) Supreme Court judge Justice U U Lalit on Saturday said opportunity should be given to children in juvenile justice homes to develop them to the fullest as citizens of the country.

"There are a large number of children in conflict with law who are in juvenile justice homes. Their education has taken a beating all across the country for the last one year.

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"We have seen that many recognised schools are struggling to impart education. In juvenile justice homes, this is one area which needs special attention. These children are in our care and custody, therefore we must make available to them every opportunity to develop them to the fullest as the citizens of the country."

Justice Lalit was speaking at the inaugural ceremony of 'Capacity Building Programme on Proactive Approach in Legal Assistance: Intervention at early stages', which was organised by Uttar Pradesh State Legal Services Authority (UPSLSA) under the aegis of National Legal Services Authority (NALSA).

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The programme was organised at Judicial Training and Research Institute (JTRI), Lucknow under the guidance of Justice Munishwar Nath Bhandari, Acting Chief Justice of Allahabad High Court and Executive Chairman, UPSLSA.

During his keynote address, Justice Lalit commended the achievements of the UPSLSA in the recently held National Lok Adalat, wherein around 12.5 lakh cases were disposed of.

He stated that these achievements have culminated through the continuous efforts of legal services authorities from the last 25 years.

Justice Lalit also highlighted various areas which require immediate attention of all the stakeholders and stated that due to lack of knowledge and information, only a negligible percentage of eligible beneficiaries avail legal services at pre-arrest stage.

He emphasised that installation of informative boards in police stations would spread awareness at any early stage of criminal justice and would help in removal of lack of knowledge and information.

With respect to the outreach of legal services, Justice Lalit stated that the collaboration with the Postal Department to install informative boards at every post office would ensure outreach of the legal services to every nook of the country.

Referring to a prison visit made by the officials of NALSA, Justice Lalit highlighted the issue of overcrowding of prisons and called upon stakeholders to ensure that "living conditions in the prison must also be of an order that we can say proudly that our citizens are being taken care of".

He further highlighted that there is still a need to make the prisoners aware of their rights and to accord them every opportunity to defend their trials and appeals.

Justice Lalit also flagged the issue of the Permanent Lok Adalats and said they are capable of disposing the disputes at an early stage and can be a crucial mechanism to decrease the burden on the judiciary.

He said effort must be made to make these adalats functional and to achieve maximum disposals through them.

During the programme, Justice Lalit also released informative posters which are going to be installed at police stations and post offices across the state of Uttar Pradesh.

The other high court judges who were present included Justices Munishwar Nath Bhandari, Pritinker Diwaker and Ritu Raj Awasthi, Allahabad High Court (Lucknow Bench).

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)