NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday warned that judicial orders based on AI-generated, non-existent judgments will amount to misconduct and not merely an error in decision-making, flagging serious concerns over the use of artificial intelligence in court proceedings.A bench of Justices PS Narasimha and Alok Aradhe said it would examine the issue in detail and issued notice to attorney general R Venkataramani, solicitor general Tushar Mehta and the Bar Council of India, reported PTI. Senior advocate Shyam Divan has been appointed to assist the court.“We take cognisance of the trial court deploying AI-generated non-existing, fake or synthetic alleged judgments and seek to examine its consequences and accountability as it has a direct bearing on the integrity of the adjudicatory process,” the bench said in its February 27 order.
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“At the outset, we must declare that a decision based on such non-existent and fake alleged judgments is not an error in the decision making. It would be a misconduct and legal consequences shall follow. It is compelling that we examine this issue in more detail,” it added, according to PTI.The issue arose during the hearing of a plea challenging a January order of the Andhra Pradesh High Court in a suit seeking an injunction. The apex court noted that a trial court had relied on certain judgments while dismissing objections to an advocate-commissioner’s report. The petitioners contended that the judgments cited were non-existent and AI-generated.The high court had acknowledged that the cited judgments were AI-generated, recorded a word of caution, but proceeded to decide the matter on merits and dismissed the civil revision petition. The petitioners subsequently moved the Supreme Court.Issuing notice, the apex court directed that pending disposal of the special leave petition, the trial court “shall not proceed on the basis of the advocate-commissioner’s report,” and posted the matter for March 10. In a separate hearing on February 17, a bench headed by Chief Justice Surya Kant also expressed concern over lawyers filing petitions drafted using AI tools that cited non-existent cases such as “Mercy vs Mankind”, while hearing a PIL seeking guidelines on political speeches.
