The Bar Council of India has directed the Uttar Pradesh Bar Council to withdraw the call for abstinence from judicial work by lawyers across the state.
According to the letter addressed to the Secretary, State Bar Council of Uttar Pradesh on Tuesday, “BCI is informed that the Bar Council of Uttar Pradesh has asked lawyers across the state to abstain from judicial work on October 20, in protest against the killing of Advocate Bhupendra Pratap Singh, who was found shot dead inside the premises of the Shahjahanpur civil court on Monday.”
While expressing “deep anguish” at the unfortunate and brutal incident, the Council said it will mention the incident in the Supreme Court and at other forums as well, in order to have a “fair, impartial and immediate investigation into the incident to book the guilty and to punish them in accordance with the provisions of law”.
The letter highlighted that even in times of such distress, however, it was reminded that abstinence/strike or boycott would not solve the problem. In fact, these frequent strikes would rather complicate the issues further and weaken the State Bar Councils as strikes were considered illegal by the Supreme Court when it concerned the Advocates, who were considered as officers of the court and as part of the judicial machinery, said the letter.
Signed by Srimanto Sen, Secretary, BCI, the letter said, “Our profession is considered as a noble profession and the professional work rendered by us is unique and for the benefit of the common man, including the aggrieved parties, who come to Advocates in the hope that the lawyers will be able to get them justice, when all doors are closed for them.
“Representations of any nature, as planned to be given to the SDM by our sisters and brother Advocates of the Tehsil concerned may be handed over. However, there should not be interference in the judicial and court work.”
The Council assured that apart from taking up this brutal issue with the top authorities, it will try its level best to have the Advocates Protection Act implemented at the earliest. It laid emphasis that the Courts all over the country, specially in Uttar Pradesh, as requested, should have a mechanism to prevent entry of any person with a firearm inside the court premises and all possible entry and exit points to the court premises should be manned and guarded properly.
BCI will certainly raise and take up this issue and try to have such a mechanism put in place by the respective state governments, it added.
“Even the claim for compensation, for the deceased Advocate, shall be supported by BCI, however, the fraternity should not abstain from court work, it being against the directions of the Supreme Court and in fact the same shall further make it difficult to fight for our rights with conviction, when we ourselves are violating the court orders,” the letter concluded.