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11 Sep 2018 5:00pm

SC Refuses to Entertain Plea Challenging Calcutta HC Guidelines for Designating Senior Advocate

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The Supreme Court on Monday refused to entertain a writ petition, filed by advocate Debasish Roy, challenging Clauses 11 and 14 of the Calcutta High Court Guidelines.

According to Roy, Clause 11 restricts Advocates from applying for the designation as a Senior Advocate, specifically the ones who are “regularly practicing” at the Calcutta HC. And thus, the petitioner claimed that the said Clause discriminates between regularly practicing and non-regularly practicing advocates at the High Court for the purpose of designation as a Senior advocate.

Another challenge that Roy mentioned in the plea was against Clause 14 which restricts collection of information of an applicant advocates pro bono work if they are not empanelled with the Legal Services Authority.

The petitioner then termed Clause 14 as self-contradictory, and stated:

In case an Applicant Advocate is not empanelled with the Legal Services Authority, then such candidate’s pro bono work will not be awarded any points at all, which is clearly discriminatory and violative of Article 14 of the Constitution. It may not be out of place to mention that there are many such committed Advocates may not be empanelled with the Legal Services Authority but are regularly rendering pro bono publico services to needy and poor litigants belonging to all sections of the society.”

The petition came for hearing before the Supreme Court bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi, Navin Sinha and KM Joseph, who made the following observation in their order:

It is, inter alia, contended by the learned counsel for the petitioner that inviting applications for designation of senior advocate(s) from advocate(s) practicing in the High Court(s) alone is contrary to the directions passed in Indira Jaising vs. Supreme Court of India & Ors., Without going into the said or any other contention raised we are of the view that the petitioner should approach the High Court on the judicial side in the first instance. We, therefore, permit the petitioner to withdraw this writ petition and instead move the High Court. The writ petition is disposed of in the above terms.”

 


Tagged: Senior Advocate Designation Guidelines Calcutta High Court Advocate Debasish Roy Supreme Court of India
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