No.- Transferred Case (Civil) NO. 126 of 2015 And Writ Petition (C) 97, 799, 644, 709, 776, 808 of 2015 And 1005 of 2016

MR. R.K. AGRAWAL AND MR. ABHAY MANOHAR, JJ.

S. Prabakaran, Sr. Adv., Raj Kumar Sharma, S.K. Sharma, S.N. Sharma, Arun Rathi, Gaurav Chandhok, Tarunesh Kumar, Dushyant Yadav, Deepak Sehrawat,  Rishina Parasher, Narendra Singh, Rohan Sharma, Irfan Firdous, V.P. Singh, Sanjay Verma, Kunal Chopra, Pradeep Kumar Sharma, Dhan Singh, Lalit Kumar, Karuna Nidhar Rawal, B.N. Sharma, Anirudha Kumar, C.P. Singh, Sanjay Singh, Manoj Panchal, Shibashish Misra, Sylona Mohapatra, Ms. Sweet Chattopadhyaya, Santosh Singh, Sidharth Mahajan, Rajeev Kumar Jha, Advs., Sriram P., Athira G. Nair, Ram Sankar, G. Ananda Selvam, V. Senthil  Kumar, Y. Lokesh, Surya Narayanan, P. Jegan, Rajaram Narayanan, Mayilsamy K., K. P. Narayanan, K. Muthu Ramesh Pardlan, Arun Singh, Nihangam Maurya, H.N. Nagamohandas, Vidit Monga, Advs. Vivek Narayan Sharma, AOR, Ms. K.R. Chltra, Ms. Sarla Chandra, Ankur S. Kulkarni, Anil  Kumar Gupta IT, R.V. Kameshwaran, P. Soma Sundaram, Anantha Narayana M.G., Satya Mitra and Vikas Upadhyay, AORs for the Petitioner.

Manan Kumar Mishra, S. Prabhakaran, Apurb Kumar Sharma, Ajit Kumar Sinha, Sr. Advs., Ms. Gunwant Dass, Nirmal Kumar Ambastha, Nitesh Ranjan, Ms. Ansul Dwivedi, Pranay Negi, Ms. Khushboo Khan, Ananta Prasad Mishra, Prabhakar Parnarn, R. Balasubramanium, Prateek Bhatia, Vishal Khattar, Ms. C. Rubavathl, V. Senthll Kumar, Ms. Maitrayee Banerjee, Anurag Dubey, Abhishek Swarup, Kishore Lambat, Aditya Sharma, Akash Jindal, Tanuj Agarwal,  Buddy A. Ranganadhan, Ms. Deepali S. Surana, Ms. Sugandha Jain, Pawan Kumar Shukla, Pankaj Kumar Singh, Manindra Dubey, Atul Jha, Sandeep Jha,S. Udaya Kumar Sagar, Ms. Bina Madhavan, Ms. Akanksha Mehra, Mrityunjai Singh, Ms. Swati Bhardwaj, Piyush Dwivedi, Prateek Dhir, Ms. Ramandeep Kaur, Mrs. Elizabeth Antony, Ms. Kasturika Kaumudl, Ms. Daisy Hannah, Ms. Ekta Pradhan, Sabarish Subramanian, M. Velmurugan, Amit Sharma, Ms. Fauzia Shakil, Ujjwal Singh, Mojahid Karim Khan, Prang Neomai, Amitesh Kumar, Shashank S. Singh, Ms. Priti Kumari, Ms. Babita Kushwaha, P. Venkat Reddy, Prashant Tyagi, Ms. Beena Victor, Ravi Ramad, Miranda Solamon, Ms. Sonam Sharma, Bhavya Tandon, Pijush K. Roy, Mrs. Kakali Roy, Suhas Kadarn, Advs., Ms. Pinky Anand, ASG, M.K. Maroria, Ardhendumauli Kumar Prasad, Ms. Sarla Chandra, Praveen Agrawal, Gagan Gupta, H. Chandra Sekhar, Ashwani Kumar Dubey, Venkateswara Rao Anumolu, Ms. Nandini Gore, Parmanand Pandey, Sudarshan Singh Rawat, Ms. Poli Kataki, Gaurav Sharma, Rameshwar Prasad Goyal, K.V. Bharathi Upadhyaya, M. Shoeb Alam, Mohinder Jit Singh, E.C. Agrawala, Himinder Lal, Shibashish Misra, Mritunjay Kumar Sinha, Subhasish Mohanty, Mohammed Sadique, T. A. Arnol B. Karande, Gopal Prasad, Anupam Lal Das, Ms. Sneha Kalita, Vikas Upadhyay, Ms. Aparna Jha, Kailash Chand, Jogy Searia, Rakesh K. Sharma, Ms. Ruehi Kohli, Deepak Goel, Aditya Singh, Rajan K. Chourasia, Ms. Lalita Kohli, Sudhanshu S. Choudhari, Ms. Manju Jetley, Mrs. Santosh Singh, Ms. Malini Poduval, S. R. Setia, Ms. Kamakshi S. Mehlwal, Y. Raja Gopala Rao, Kunal Chatterji, Rajeev Singh, Anjani Kumar Mishra, Christi Jain, Harvinder Chowdhury, M. A. Chlnnasamy, P.V. Dinesh, A.V. Rangarn, Sunil Fernandes, Dr. Harsh V. Surana, Dharmendra Kumar Sinha, Shekhar Kumar, G.S. Makkar, AORs and S.N. Pandey, Intervener for the Respondent.

JUDGMENT

R.K. Agrawal, J. –The present transferred case has originated owing to the steps taken by the Bar Council of India to cause an enquiry and to find out fake lawyers out of its members and/or not even a member of the Bar Councils and/or member of any Bar Association of the country. While countering, Bar Council of India has submitted that steps have been taken in the matter in accordance with the Advocates Act, 1961 and the Rules framed thereunder to come to a conclusion and to find out such number of fake lawyers in the country and only thereafter the elections to the State Bar Councils can be held.

2. This Court, vide order dated 05.10.2015, directed that all the matters which are pending in different High Courts in connection with the matter in question be transferred to this court for hearing while refusing to grant stay in respect of giving effect to the Notification in connection with the Bar Council of India Certificate and Place of Practice (Verification) Rules, 2015.

3. Further, in pursuance thereto, this court, vide order dated 02.11.2015, directed that the persons who are not members of the Bar Association of any State or District or otherwise to carry on their profession, the certificate which has been asked for by the Bar Council of India to be attached with the application form that should be taken into account by the respective Bar Councils allowing them to apply and thereby on such application concerned, Bar Council will take necessary steps to find out the correct position in respect of those persons. It was further made clear that the persons who were practicing as a conveyancing lawyer or otherwise or in terms of the Rules of Advocates Act in any manner whatsoever, they should not be interfered with carrying on their practice in such manner whatsoever by the Bar Council of India, if they are legally enrolled through the Bar Councils.

4. Heard learned counsel for both the sides on the question of holding elections to the State Bar Councils at the earliest and perused the records.

5. Learned senior counsel for the Bar Council of India admitted that the work relating to verification is very slow as the States where Advocate Generals are functioning as the Chairman of the State Bar Councils and elections are due, they are unable to spare time for the affairs of the State Bar Councils due to heavy workload. Further, no verification of certificates/degrees have been undertaken for LLB Graduates seeking enrolment after July 2010 and the All India Bar Examination (AIBE) cannot be said to be proof of having a valid degree of any candidate. In order to expedite the process of verification of degrees, the Bar Council of India proposes to constitute a Central Verification Committee of the Bar Council of India headed by a former Judge of this Court for the purpose of transparent and fair verification.

6. To put it in a nutshell, the petitioners are requesting for immediate elections of the State Bar Council as the term has expired long back whereas the Bar Council of India is pressing for the need of verification of the candidates to eliminate fake lawyers in order to bring improvement in the Bar and to get deserving practicing advocates for the respective Bar Councils.

7. We have been informed by learned senior counsel for the Bar Council of India as well as the respective State Bar Councils that the process of verification is not completed yet. In view of that, to do complete justice to the parties, it would be proper for us to provide a last opportunity for the same as mentioned below:-

(1) 15 (fifteen) days' time be given to cure the defective applications by the concerned Advocates and to all such advocates to submit their complete application forms for necessary verification of their degrees if they have not submitted the same earlier, from the date of publication of advertisement in two leading newspapers, one in English language and the other in regional language having wide circulation in the respective State/Union Territories, for which advertisement shall be published within 7 days from the passing of this order.

(2) 1 (one) month time for verification of applications, without any charge, by the State Bar Councils, after the expiry of the above 15 (fifteen) days.

(3) The University Authorities shall ensure the verification of degrees awarded by them, without any charge, within 1 (month) on its presentation.

(4) The respective State Bar Councils shall publish a Final Electoral Roll by including the names and particulars of such advocates whose degrees attached with the application forms have been verified by the concerned University authorities. The names of all such advocates who have not removed the defects in the application forms already submitted within the specified time and also such persons whose degrees on verification have been found false or fake by the University authorities shall not be included in the Electoral Rolls.

(5) Bar Council of India to declare the schedule of elections in respective State Bar Councils to be held after the expiry of 75 (seventy five) days, as mentioned above, within one week mentioning therein:-

(i) 15 days for nomination.
(ii) 1 week for withdrawal of nomination.
(iii) to upload final candidates' list in 1 (one) week.
(iv) to decide the date of election.

8. We further make it clear that all the steps be taken by all the parties concerned in the matter for the purpose of elections in respect of all the Bar Councils where the term of the existing members have already expired or to be expired. We further make it clear that although this order has been passed in favour of the verification only for the purpose of the election but it would also include for the purpose of the verification of all other learned lawyers who have already applied within the time stipulated by this Court.

9. We direct all the State Bar Councils to take necessary steps and to conclude all proceedings by 31.12.2017 and send a reply to the Bar Council of India. Thereafter, the Bar Council of India, after receiving all the replies from the State Bar Councils, would file a status report.

10. We, hereby, authorize the Bar Council of India to notify all the State Bar Councils, by way of publication in two leading newspapers, that they must take all steps to complete the process before 31.12.2017.

11. The Bar Council of India is directed to request a retired Judge of the Supreme Court in order to control and supervise the verification process and preparation of Electoral Rolls. We direct the Bar Council of India to take all steps in this regard immediately in order to do the needful. All concerned are directed to render full assistance and cooperation to the Verification Committee. List the matter in the second week of January, 2018 on a Non-Miscellaneous Day.

Hon'ble Mr. Justice R.K. Agrawal pronounced the reportable order of the Bench comprising His Lordship and Hon'ble Mr. Justice Abhay Manohar Sapre.

The Court issued certain directions and directed to list these matters in the second week of January, 2018 on a Non-Miscellaneous Day in terms of the signed reportable order.