From Legal Aid To Substantive Justice: An Empirical Assessment Of India's Legal Services Framework

Abstract

Access to justice is a constitutional commitment that extends beyond the formal availability of courts and legal remedies. In India, Article 39A of the Constitution requires the State to secure equal justice and provide free legal aid so that opportunities for securing justice are not denied because of economic or other disabilities. The enactment of the Legal Services Authorities Act 1987 institutionalised this commitment through the National Legal Services Authority (NALSA), State Legal Services Authorities, District Legal Services Authorities and Taluk Legal Services Committees. However, the expansion of institutional mechanisms does not necessarily establish that legal aid has translated into substantive justice. This paper empirically assesses the performance and limitations of India's legal-services framework through secondary analysis of official data published by NALSA for 2024–25 and 2025–26, including beneficiary statistics, legal-awareness programmes and Lok Adalat outcomes. The study finds significant institutional reach, with more than 1.65 million persons receiving legal services in 2024–25 and more than 2 million in 2025–26. Legal-awareness initiatives also reached over 37.2 million persons in 2024–25[1]. And data collected by the researcher shows considerable inter-state variation and continuing concentration of beneficiaries among particular vulnerable groups. And the researcher is of the view point that we can not take numerical expansion as the expression of substantive access to justice. For effective and actual legal empowerment we need competent representation, timely intervention, institutional accountability and meaningful participation of beneficiaries. [1] National Legal Services Authority, ‘Awareness Camps/Programmes, April 2024 to March 2025’ (NALSA 2025).