This is the second incident during my judgeship at Allahabad that dealt with lawyers.
One day, the lawyers got a chance to hit back.
One lawyer was held to be guilty of contempt and was given some punishment in jail. It was stayed by a division bench in appeal. It was tied up with that senior judge. Whenever, there was a lawyer from Delhi appearing in his court, then advocates would instigate the lawyer held guilty of contempt to create difficulties in his court. One day, out of frustration, the senior judge vacated the stay order and the lawyer was sent to jail.
The lawyer, who was sent to jail, went on a hunger strike. He was mishandled by the jail authorities, while trying to feed him. He was injured and was sent to the hospital, where he died.
The High Court was informed that the dead body would be brought to the court on the next day. Well, this meant trouble. We had to take action to avoid it.
Hurriedly, the Chief Justice called a meeting of the senior judges at his residence in the evening to chalk out a strategy to handle the situation for the next day. It was decided that:
- The court should start functioning at 11:30am instead of its normal time of 10:00am;
- The senior judge was requested not to sit in the open court and he did not sit in the court next day;
- Rapid action force (RAC) was also called in but was requested to station themselves a kilometre away from the court, so as not to appear that it is there for the court.
The next day, as decided by the advocates, the dead body was brought to the High Court premises around 9:30am. The family of the deceased lawyer was also there.
With some persuasion and help from the office bearers of the Bar council, the advocates were persuaded to take the dead body for cremation. When the pyre was lit, the Chief Justice and some other judges (including me), who had gone for cremation, came back and started our courts.
Nevertheless, the advocates thought that something more should be done to show their displeasure for the senior judge for his misbehaviour. They started ruckus in the empty court of that senior judge. They broke glasses, and chairs, burnt books in that court. The lawyers also created commotion in the two other courts, where judges were very friendly with that senior judge. No other court was disturbed. It was a crowd of 300 to 400 advocates and was difficult to control.
I was presiding a bench in my court and could hear them shouting. I along with my junior judge went up to the lawyers trying to cool them down but with no result. Thereafter I went two more times (one with the same junior judge of my bench and the other time with another different junior judge) explaining the advocates that in case they do not stop, then the Chief Justice would have no option but to take drastic action. But the advocates didn’t listen.
Ultimately, the Chief justice announced on a loudspeaker that he was going to count three and if the lawyers did not desist then he will have no option but to order Latthi charge.
The courts in Allahabad are on the first floor. The advocates did not desist and the Chief Justice ordered Latthi charge. However, the RAF was instructed to climb half the stairs, make noises with their boots and sticks so as to sound that they are coming up for Latthi charge but neither they were to go up nor Latthi charge the advocates.
The advocates got panicky and left the court room. The day was saved. Had Latthi charge been done, then it would have surely resulted into a statewide strike. This action made the advocates defensive. They apologised and offered to compensate the entire damages. It was not accepted but a solemn promise was taken that such an incident will never be repeated.
This incident taught me two things: respect advocates, never degrade or discriminate amongst them. If you respect them, they will respect you back; and secondly how to handle a tricky situation with the advocates.
#AdviceToYoungJudges #GoodJudge
Sir is samay bhi ek Me Lord hai ,jinke lips aur chehre ke bhav se pata chalta rahta hai
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