The Lieutenant Governor, Vinai Kumar Saxena, on Wednesday reviewed the functioning and progress of works undertaken by the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL), and directed the officials to take all necessary steps in terms of manpower and technological upgradation, to appropriately dispose of the pending cases in a time bound manner.

As per the statement released by the LG office, expressing concern over the number of pending cases, which amounted to more than 20,000, that were yet to be reported, he directed officials to take all necessary steps in terms of manpower and technological upgradation to appropriately dispose of the same in a time-bound manner.

“Saxena took exception to various technical posts lying vacant and issued strict instructions to fill them at the earliest. He directed that retired technical personnel from similar agencies and organizations should be re-employed immediately as an interim and temporary measure to ensure that pending cases are disposed and reported,” it said.

“The LG urged the FSL to look at itself from a different perspective, of not just being another government department but as an agency upon which not only the delivery of justice but thousands of lives depended as well,” it read.

“Reiterating that they will have to undertake work of disposing cases on a war-footing, the LG told the officials to rise up their responsibility and ensure that human lives whose future depended on the evidence provided by them are not short-changed.

To this effect, he directed that all SOPs and processes are meticulously followed and ordered for putting in place technology enabled automated systems that minimized human interface,” the statement further stated.