All court/chamber proceedings in Singapore are conducted in English. The Language Services department of the State Courts provides interpretation services to parties in court proceedings/court users who do not speak or have limited knowledge of the English Language.
The languages and dialects provided are as follows:
Chinese Languages | Mandarin, Hokkien, Teochew and Cantonese |
Malay Languages | Malay, Javanese and Boyanese |
Indian Languages | Tamil, Malayalam and Urdu |
Counsel and Litigants-in-person in civil matters who require the services of court interpreters should submit their requests via e-Litigation. All requests should be submitted in writing no later than 2 working days from the date of the Pre-Trial Conference or other proceeding at which the hearing date is fixed, or at least 2 weeks before the day on which the services of a court interpreter are required, whichever is earlier. If no prior request has been made, any deployment of an interpreter will be subject to availability.