Supreme Court seeks response of Centre, Bar Councils on PIL to safeguard lawyers' privileges, protection

The Supreme Court on Tuesday sought responses from the Central government and the Bar Council of India (BCI) in a plea for directions to safeguard the privileges of lawyers as well as their protection [Aaditya Gore v. Union of India].

The Public Interest Litigation (PIL), among other prayers, urges BCI and state bar councils to frame rules under Section 7(d) of the Advocates Act, 1961 for protecting advocates’ privileges, and to constitute a committee under Section 10(3) to address related grievances through a uniform and transparent mechanism.

A Bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta tagged the matter with a pending suo motu case recently initiated by the Supreme Court in the wake of investigating agencies summoning lawyers over legal advice rendered to clients. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) had recently issued summons to Senior Advocates Arvind Datar and Pratap Venugopal.

The PIL has been filed by Advocate Aaditya Gore. Appearing for him, Advocate Nishant R Katneshwarkar informed the Court that Gore has been pursuing the Centre and the Bar Council of India on the issue for nearly 11 years. He added that despite these efforts, no action has been taken till date.

According to the plea, despite repeated representations and a long-pending Advocates (Protection) Bill, there exists no formal mechanism across State Bar Councils to deal with such grievances.

The plea highlights over a dozen recent incidents of attacks, harassment, and violence against lawyers - including instances in Delhi, Maharashtra, Telangana, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh - as evidence of the urgent need for institutional protection. It states that such incidents compromise the fearless discharge of advocates’ duties and adversely impact the administration of justice.

'The repeated attacks on Advocates undermines not only the personal dignity of individual Advocates but undermines and compromises the dignity of the administration of justice,” the plea reads.

The petitioner further submitted that since the Advocates (Protection) Bill remains pending with the Law Commission, the current petition restricts itself to matters already within the statutory framework of the Advocates Act, 1961 and does not seek legislative intervention.

The PIL also urges that until comprehensive rules are formulated, complaints of breach of privileges be dealt with on a provisional basis under the modalities provided for disciplinary proceedings under the BCI Rules.

The plea was filed through Advocate-on-Record Ganu Suvarna Siddhanath.

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