Shri Ramakrishna Math v. T.Padmavathy
in OP SR.No.45981 of 2022 KRISHNAN RAMASAMY, J.
This application has been filed by the applicant, urging this Court to accept the English translation of a Tamil Will dated 21.09.2017 in respect of which, Letters of Administration has been sought for by the applicant in the Original Petition.
2. The learned counsel appearing for the applicant would submit that though the Will has been filed along with the petition in the month of April, the matter has been pending for want of translation of the same and hence, the applicant himself got translated it in English and filed the same. Therefore, the learned counsel would urge this Court to accept the same and prays for early disposal without any further delay.
3. Considering the submission made by the learned counsel for the applicant and to avoid delay in the matter, this Court feels it appropriate to allow the application. Accordingly, this Application is allowed. The 1/4
Registry is directed to number the O.P. And list it before this Court. However, it is made clear that later any discrepancy is found in the translated version of the Will, the applicant will be held responsible.
4. In fact, the work of translation of Wills and other documents from one language to English has been undertaken by the Interpretors in the Original Side, appointed by the Registry. While so, after taking note of the present application, this Court enquired with the Registry, which brought to the notice of this Court that there are only three Interpretors available as against the sanctioned strength of 11 posts in different languages. It is quite surprising to note that no recruitment of Interpretors has been made by the Registry for over a decade, i.e. after 2009.
5. There are more than 60 Wills pending on the file of the Registry for translation and such translation is being done in a chronological order corresponding to the date of filing. It is very unfortunate that earlier, when this Court required a document of Malayalam language to be translated into English, since there was no Malayalam Interpretor, despite sanctioned post, 2/4
the job was sought to be done by taking the assistance of Kerala High Court. The post of Interpretor does not only involve translating the Wills, documents into English, but also attending the Master and Additional Masters' Courts for the purpose of recording the evidence in Testamentary proceedings, Guardian O.P.s, Execution Petitions and Insolvency Petitions and they also act as Commissioners' of Oaths for party-in-persons and litigants who are not acquainted with English language and sign in vernacular. Due to insufficient strength of Interpretors, the matters have been adjourned from time to time, which prompted the parties to come forward with the applications, like present one, urging this Court to accept the translated Wills into English from different languages and this Court, without verification, is constrained to accept the same in order to avoid the delay, which causes much inconvenience to this Court.
6. Therefore, in order to avoid delay in getting the translation of the documents and inconvenience, the Registrar (Recruitment), High Court of 3/4
KRISHNAN RAMASAMY, J.
Suk Madras, is directed to take earnest efforts for filling up of the vacancies of Interpretors on a war footing and complete the process of filling up of the same within a reasonable time, preferably within a period of three months to nine months and enable the Courts dealing with the cases on Original side, to dispose of the matters without depending upon the translated copies of Wills and other documents being filed by the parties themselves. Suk 03.08.2022 Copy to The Registrar (Recruitment), High Court of Madras, Chennai-104.
in OP SR.No.45981 of 2022 4/4