Supreme Court judge and Executive Chairman of the National Legal Services Authority (NALSA), Justice Surya Kant, has called for the justice system to extend its reach beyond the confines of courtrooms and touch the lives of those living on the margins, particularly in India’s eastern and northeastern regions.

Delivering the inaugural address at the NALSA East-Zone Regional Conference in Sonapur, Guwahati, Justice Surya Kant described the event as “a reaffirmation that our commitment to justice must reach where it has been slow to travel — across the valleys, tea gardens, and borderlands of India’s East.”

Highlighting what he termed the “paradox of abundance and vulnerability,” the judge noted that while the region contributes richly to India’s economy and culture — from Assam’s tea and Odisha’s coastline to Bengal’s intellectual traditions and Jharkhand’s minerals — many states still struggle with poverty, inequality, and inaccessibility of justice.

“True progress is not measured by GDP or statistics,” he said, “but by whether justice, dignity, and opportunity are equitably distributed across every community.”

Justice Surya Kant identified pressing regional challenges, including child marriage, drug abuse, displacement of tribal communities, exploitation of tea garden workers, and a rising mental health crisis. Citing data, he noted that Bihar still records around 40% of women married before 18, while Assam has witnessed a six-fold increase in NDPS cases in four years — evidence of “structural vulnerability.”

He urged legal services institutions to become the “bridge between law and life,” ensuring that justice is not limited to books or courtrooms but reaches those most in need. NALSA, he said, is already implementing several initiatives such as:

• DAWN (Drug Awareness and Wellness Navigation) for prevention and rehabilitation,

• ASHA, a framework to combat child marriage through education and skill-building,

• SAMVAD, to extend legal aid to tribal and denotified communities, and

• Legal Services to Workers in the Unorganised Sector, focused on workplace dignity and fair wages.

Justice Surya Kant also announced the launch of the ‘NALSA Veer Parivar Sahayata Yojana 2025’, which provides free legal assistance to families of defence personnel serving in difficult border areas. Describing NALSA’s initiatives as part of an “architecture of care,” he invoked the spirit of Ubuntu — “I am because you are” — and the Indian ethos of Manav Seva Hi Madhav Seva (service to humanity is service to God).

He reminded that the true test of such conferences lies not in speeches or resolutions but in tangible outcomes — “when a child in Bihar is saved from early marriage, a youth in Nagaland breaks free from addiction, a tribal family in Odisha secures forest rights, or a tea worker in Assam sees her children educated and nourished.”

Calling for stronger coordination between agencies and the effective use of technology to deliver justice in remote areas, he cautioned that “technology must remain a bridge, not a substitute.” Above all, he urged the legal community to “cultivate the courage to listen — to children, workers, tribes, and those battling despair — and shape justice not in our language, but in their sentiments.”

Concluding his address, Justice Surya Kant described India’s eastern states as “frontiers of justice” rather than mere geographical boundaries. Quoting Assamese saint Srimanta Sankardev — “Manuhor maromat Ishwar thake” (God resides in human compassion) — he said, “If compassion is where divinity resides, then our legal services institutions must remain temples of such compassion.”

The two-day conference, jointly organised by NALSA, the Assam State Legal Services Authority, and the Gauhati High Court, is addressing issues including child rights, narcotics control, tribal protection, labour welfare, and mental health.