The movement of the Indian Law Reports started long back in the year 1875, when the Act of The Indian Law Reports was enacted. State of Madhya Pradesh came into being in the year 1956, so also the High Court of M.P.. The Government of Madhya Pradesh, Law Department made rules regarding publication of The Indian Law Reports M.P. Series. The Notification in this regard was published in the State Gazette in the month of April, 1957. The High Court of Madhya Pradesh Jabalpur, since inception, publishes The Indian Law Reports MP Series. The first President of Law Reporting Committee was Hon’ble Mr. Justice B. K. Choudhuri. Earlier it was being published from Bhopal. Considering the difficulties in that process, it was decided to print and publish at Jabalpur itself. At that time, 1500 copies were being published. In the year 2003, Hon’ble Mr. Justice Rajaratnam took charge of the Chief Justice of the M.P. High Court. His Lordship felt that late publication of the Indian Law Reports could not yield any results, that’s why his Lordship directed to only print current issues of The Indian Law Reports. Resultantly issues from the year 1993 to 1997 and of 2002 were not published. Thereafter, Hon’ble Mr. Justice R.V. Reveendran resumed charge of the Chief Justice of the High Court of Madhya Pradesh and tried to improve the condition of The Indian Law Reports. Later, Hon’ble Mr. Justice A.K. Patnaik resumed charge of the Chief Justice of Madhya Pradesh High Court and under able guidance of His Lordship and Hon’ble Mr. Justice A.K. Mishra the then President, Law Reporting Committee the backlog was successfully cleared. After posting of Shri Jarat Kumar Jain (now retired High Court Judge) in the year 2008 as the Principal Registrar of The Indian Law Reports the work of compilation of 50 Years’ Digest (1956-2006) was started by him. Publishing of Head Notes in Hindi as well was started by him in the same year. He started publication of I.L.R. in three volumes. In the year 2010 Shri Awdhesh Kumar Shrivastava, HJS, resume charge of Principal Registrar I.L.R. and made strenuous efforts under the able guidance of the President of LRC Hon’ble Shri Justice K.K. Lahoti. He increased number of reported cases in the ILR issues and started publishing of I.L.R. in four volumes. He also completed the work of 50 Years’ Digest. Besides this, arrangement of 5 Years’ Digest (2006-2010) was made in record time by him. The ILR has also managed to publish 3 years’ Digest (2008-2010) in Hindi language. All three version of Digests are available for the Readers in the market. The ILR is presently working in publishing 5 Years’ Digest (2011-2015) in English language followed by its Hindi version.

In the begining as per the notification issued by the Law Department, Bhopal on 01st April, 1957, sanctioned staff for editing the Indian Law Reports comprised of an Editor and a Reporter and continued to be same for years. Shri Akhil Kumar Srivastava, HJS, took charge of Principal Registrar I.L.R. in the year 2013 and he felt the need to increase and restructure the cadre strength of ILR. During his tenure at first the post of Part-time Editor was upgraded to Part-time ‘Chief Editor’ and it came into force by the order of the Law Department, Bhopal w.e.f. 05.06.2015. Thereafter, 5 new posts of Part-time Reporters were also got sanctioned by the Law Department, Bhopal vide order dated 01.12.2014. As on date 8 Part-time Reporters are working for the ILR. 4 Part-time Reporters are working for Principal Seat and 2 each in Benches of the High Court. Considering the increase in number of Judges and consequent increase in the number of Reportable judgments/orders it give rise the need to increase the strength of Editor. Shri Akhil Kumar Srivastava took all his efforts to got sanction 3 new posts of Part-time Editor for the ILR by the Law Department, Bhopal and it came into existence w.e.f 23.10.2015. As on date 1 Editor is working in each Seat of the High Court looking after editing work of Reporters. This apart, 20 posts in different cadre was also sanctioned for the ILR Section of the High Court vide order dated 07.05.2016 of the Law Department, Bhopal. Under the direction of Akhil Kumar Srivastava a separate website has been launched for the Indian Law Reports MP Series where one can get various information about ILR MP Series including availability of old publication. Facility of making online request for purchase of monthly issues/Digest of ILR MP Series by the subscriber will be provided soon. The work of digitization of ILR is also under process. ILR MP Series issues beginning from the 1956 is being made available in digital form for the valuable readers of the ILR.

Being a welfare State, State has to perform so many duties incurring cost on its own shoulders. The Indian Law Reports is one of them. It is not meant for earning profit, it is meant for benevolence of litigants, that is why it is provided in nominal charges, so that more and more people particularly Junior Lawyers could be benefited. Earlier, 12 issues were being sold at a price of Rs. 9 per annum. In the year 1963, this rate was revised and its price was fixed Rs. 15/- per annum. After a gap of 43 years its price was enhanced from Rs. 15 to Rs. 200 per annum in the year 2006. Further revision took place in the year 2007 from Rs. 200 /- to Rs. 300/- per annum and then revised to Rs. 400/- per annum in the year 2011 and then Rs. 475/- per annum for the year 2015. The price was again revised and fixed to Rs. 550/- per annum in the year 2016 which is also same for the year 2017.The annual subscription price for the year 2018 has been fixed as Rs. 600/-, including postal charges. At present 4000 copies of ILR issues are printed monthly.

Every Journal requires its registration with the Registrar of Newspapers of India, New Delhi and without RNI’s Registration no journal could be registered with the Postal Department. The Indian Law Reports got its registration with RNI in the year 2009 bearing Number MPBIL/2009/32366 and also with Postal Department, resultantly, the Subscribers of The Indian Law Reports are getting subsidy in Postal charges by the Postal Department.

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