A board is the only source that is true in minutes rather than in days. It also has a vocabulary of its own, and nobody hands you a key to it.
A court display board shows which item a bench is hearing at that moment, court by court. It is live only while the court is sitting, roughly 10:30 to 16:30 IST on working days, and it moves faster than any list — an item can be reached, passed over or part-heard within minutes.
A board is terse by design. Each of these carries a specific meaning, and mistaking one for another sends people to the wrong courtroom at the wrong time.
The place of a matter in the day's order before that bench. The board shows the item running now. The gap between that number and yours is your remaining time — a rough estimate, because one item can take thirty seconds and the next an hour.
The matter was reached, counsel was not ready or not present, and the bench moved on without deciding anything. It normally comes back later the same day, once the board has run further. A pass-over buys time; it does not create a new date.
The bench started the matter and did not finish. It returns before the same bench and is generally taken up early next time. On a live board, a part-heard item is the usual reason a court that should be at item 30 is still at item 4.
Matters coming before the bench for the first time, typically at admission. Many boards group them at the start of the sitting, which is why an early item number on a fresh matter does not always mean an early hearing.
Notice has gone to the other side and the matter returns with the respondent expected to appear. It is no longer one-sided, which usually means it takes longer than it did the first time.
Argument is over, or a narrow question is before the bench, and what remains is the pronouncement of an order. These items move fast and can clear ten places on a board in a few minutes.
The bench has heard the matter in full and kept judgment. It will not come back on a board for hearing. When it reappears, it is for pronouncement, and nothing further is expected from counsel until then.
The bench has finished the listed work and risen. Anything not reached goes back for a fresh date rather than being taken up late. If you are item 70 and the board is over, your matter did not fail — it simply was not reached.
A blank board is the single most searched thing about boards, and it is almost never a fault.
Benches are constituted for particular days. A court that heard writs on Monday may not sit at all on Tuesday, and a board with no bench behind it has nothing to display.
Gazetted holidays and court vacations differ from state to state, which is precisely why they matter to a deadline as much as to a hearing. The limitation clocks roll past them; a blank board is the same calendar seen from the other side.
The listed work is finished and the bench has risen for the day. This is the most common blank of all, and it usually arrives earlier in the afternoon than people expect.
Before the sitting begins there is nothing to show. A board checked at 10:05 for a court that rises at 10:30 will be empty and will tell you nothing about the day.
Most courts break in the middle of the day. Boards go quiet and then resume where they left off, so a blank at half past one is usually a pause rather than an ending.
Display board is the common term, but it is not universal: the Allahabad High Court calls its live board Court View, and advocates at the Punjab and Haryana High Court routinely search for the PHHC display board. If a court you appear in uses a different name, the underlying thing is the same — which item each court is on, updated while the court sits.
Court-by-court detail sits on the individual court pages.
| Source | What it shows | When it is true | The question it answers |
|---|---|---|---|
| Display board | The item a bench is on at this moment. | Only while the court is sitting. | How long have I got before I am called? |
| Cause list | The day's schedule — matters, benches, item numbers. | From the evening before until the court rises. | Am I listed, and where in the order? |
| Case status | The standing record — parties, stage, last order, next date. | Until something happens to change it. | What happened, and what is the position now? |
The board is the shortest-lived and the most immediately useful of the three. It is also the only one that cannot be read in advance, which is why the chamber habit that works is: list at night, board in the morning, record afterwards.
A board in a corridor shows one court. Counsel with three matters before three benches on the same morning has historically solved this with people — a junior in one passage, a clerk in another, and a phone call when something moves.
Inside Lawgger, the boards for the benches you care about sit on one screen, during court hours, across the Supreme Court, all 25 High Courts, NCLT, NCLAT and CAT — 527 courts and 426 benches in all. You see the item each of them is on without leaving the room you are in. Court coverage is set out here.
This marketing page does not carry live board data. There is no live board on lawgger.com and no free public board lookup here. The boards run inside the app, behind your login, where your matters already are.
Lawgger is software for advocates. It is not a law firm and gives no legal advice.
A court display board shows which item a bench is hearing at that moment, court by court. It exists so that people waiting outside a courtroom, and people in chambers elsewhere in the city, can see how far down the day's list a bench has travelled without standing at the door.
The item number is the position of a matter in the order in which a bench takes up work that day. The board shows the item being heard now. The gap between that number and yours is the only estimate of remaining time you have, and it is a rough one, because items take anything from thirty seconds to an hour.
Pass over means the matter was reached, counsel was not ready or not present, and the bench moved on without deciding anything. It is normally taken up again later the same day, after the board has run further down. A pass-over buys time; it does not create a new date.
Part-heard means the bench began hearing the matter and did not finish it. It usually goes back before the same bench, and on the day it is next listed it is generally taken up early, because the bench already has the matter in mind. On a board, a part-heard item can hold a court for a long time.
Five ordinary reasons. The court is not sitting that day. It is a gazetted holiday or a court vacation. The bench has finished the board and risen. The bench has not assembled yet. Or the court has broken for lunch. A blank board is almost never a fault; it usually means nothing is being heard at that minute.
Boards run while the court is sitting, which across most Indian courts means roughly 10:30 to 16:30 IST on working days, with a break in the middle. Exact sitting hours differ between courts and change during vacations, so treat those timings as the general pattern rather than a guarantee for any particular bench.
Physically, no — a board in a corridor shows one court. That is exactly the problem Lawgger solves: several benches side by side on one screen, so counsel with matters before three courts on the same morning can see all three positions at once instead of sending a junior to stand in a passage.
Court View is the name the Allahabad High Court uses for its live board. It is the same idea as a display board elsewhere: which item each court is on, updated while the court sits. Naming varies across the country, which is why people search for display board, court view and PHHC display board and mean the same thing.
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