Just days after a video of two advocates starting a quarrel with policemen at a lower court complex in Egmore went viral on social media, the Madras High Court expressed deep anguish over a section of lawyers refusing to mend their ways.
A Division Bench of Justices N. Kirubakaran and R. Pongiappan vented their feelings during the hearing of a writ petition filed by an advocate challenging the proceedings initiated against him by the Bar Council of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry (BCTNP) for not vacating his office despite the landlord’s insistence.
Quashes plea
Not in favour of entertaining the writ petition, the judges told the petitioner’s counsel that an advocate cannot squat over a rented property forever and claim that his profession was wedded to the building from where he works. They granted the petitioner, a week’s time to vacate and report compliance.
“Suppose if some other landlord engages the petitioner to conduct a case before a court of law, what kind of grounds can the lawyer take when he himself is an erring tenant?” the senior judge in the Bench wondered. He also lamented the falling moral and professional standards among the lawyer community.
When the petitioner’s counsel contended that a dispute between a lawyer and his landlord could not be adjudicated by the Bar Council and cited certain provisions of the Advocates Act of 1961, Justice Kirubakaran retorted: “The 1961 Act has to be thrown into the Bay of Bengal and a new Act has to be brought into force.” He pointed out that the law was enacted over five decades ago when lawyers commanded very high respect in society. Then, the lawmakers had not envisaged that the standard of legal professionals would some day fall as low as it was at present.
‘There is regression’
“Other professionals have advanced and we have fallen in our own eyes,” the judge rued.
Justice Kirubakaran expressed pain over almost one in every five bail petitions filed in the court being a criminal case involving a lawyer.
“Advocates should be respected. Their conduct should be so. If they are going to continue like this, nobody will respect them. Those interested in the profession must flush out the erring elements,” he added.