New Delhi, Dec. 30 -- Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant on Monday initiated a significant overhaul of the Supreme Court's functioning, introducing mandatory timelines for oral arguments and restructuring the court's listing priorities to ensure faster, more predictable, and inclusive justice delivery. Through two administrative circulars issued on Monday, the apex court formally operationalised reforms that justice Kant had flagged soon after assuming office on November 24, including reducing delays, rationalising court time, and ensuring that the justice system meaningfully served ordinary litigants and vulnerable groups. In a move likely to fundamentally alter courtroom practice at the Supreme Court, the first circular mandates that all lawyers, including senior advocates, will now be bound by prefixed and strictly enforced timelines while arguing cases. The measure is aimed at improving court management, ensuring equitable distribution of judicial working hours, and addressing long-standing concerns about protracted hearings. "In order to facilitate effective court management and equitable distribution of court working hours and to ensure speedy and proper administration of justice," stated the circular, a standard operating procedure (SoP) for oral arguments will apply "with immediate effect" to all post-notice and regular hearing matters. Under the new regime, senior advocates, arguing counsel and advocates-on-record will be required to submit proposed timelines for their oral arguments at least one day before the hearing. These timelines must be uploaded through the existing online portal used for filing appearance slips. Further, counsel must also file a brief note or written submission, not exceeding five pages, at least three days before the hearing after serving a copy on the opposing side. The note is intended to enable judges to familiarise themselves with the core issues in advance and to ensure adherence to the time limits fixed for oral submissions. "All counsel shall strictly adhere to the timelines fixed and conclude their oral arguments," emphasised the circular, signalling a decisive move towards curbing open-ended hearings that often spill over multiple days. People aware of the development told HT that the new framework sought to bring predictability to hearings, allowing benches to plan their time more efficiently while ensuring that no single matter disproportionately consumed judicial hours at the cost of others. The second circular, also issued on Monday, restructured the order in which matters are listed on miscellaneous days, introducing four new categories that explicitly prioritise cases involving vulnerable sections of society. As per the revised causelist structure, matters will now be taken up in a specified sequence, beginning with early hearing applications, fresh matters and bail cases, and moving through post-notice interim matters, settlement cases, and personal appearance cases. Significantly, the court has introduced four new priority heads -- cases relating to specially-abled persons and acid attack victims; cases involving senior citizens above the age of 80; cases concerning persons below the poverty line; and legal aid matters. These categories have been inserted ahead of transfer petitions, orders, public interest litigations and part-heard matters, signalling a clear institutional preference for cases involving heightened vulnerability. To operationalise the change, the Supreme Court has directed members of the Bar, parties-in-person and other stakeholders to clearly mention the applicable category while filing fresh petitions. Supporting documentary proof issued by an appropriate government authority must also be submitted. Similar details are to be furnished in pending matters so that the registry can update case records and prioritise listings accordingly. "This will enable the registry to prioritise listing of such cases," the circular states, underlining the court's intention to move beyond ad hoc prioritisation towards a structured, transparent system. Earlier this month, CJI Kant had declared that establishing predictable timelines for case disposal and evolving a unified national judicial policy would be his foremost priorities as Chief Justice. Speaking at the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit 2025 on December 6 -- his first major public address after taking office -- CJI Kant described judicial reform as imperative to restoring public confidence and ensuring equal treatment for all litigants. "My first priority will be a predictable timeline and a unified national judicial policy for early decisions of the pending cases," he had said, stressing that pendency, particularly of old cases, demanded urgent institutional attention. The urgency of such reforms is underscored by the scale of pendency across the judiciary. According to the National Judicial Data Grid (NJDG), more than 48 million cases are pending before district courts across the country, while high courts have over 6.3 million pending matters. The Supreme Court alone is grappling with a backlog of over 91,000 cases....