Take steps to enact Advocates Protection Bill expeditiously, high court tells Delhi govt
Justice Sachin Datta gave these directions on April 21 while hearing a petition being filed by advocates Deepa Joseph and Alpha Phiris Dayal seeking direction for the Centre and the Delhi government to consider enacting the Advocates Protection Bill in Delhi.
According to a status report filed by the Delhi government on September 9, 2024, the final draft of the Advocates Protection Bill, 2024. has been prepared by the Law Department, and this draft is required to be considered by the Council of Ministers.
However, a copy of this draft was not provided to the applicants who had approached the high court seeking a copy.
'In the circumstances, the present application is allowed. The GNCTD (Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi) is directed to provide a draft of the Advocate Protection Bill, 2024 to the applicant,' said the high court. It also directed the Delhi government to file a fresh status report by May 28.
As per the Delhi government, the Bill will require approval from the Council of Ministers, after which it will be referred to the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi for approval.
Through an order passed on May 25, 2023, the Delhi High Court directed the Delhi government to file a status report in relation to the first draft of Delhi Advocates Protection Bill, which was prepared by the coordination committee (of all district court bar associations). This draft was sent to the law minister and chief minister of Delhi. The Law Department prepared the final draft of the Bill after this.
The draft prepared by the coordination committee recommended police protection, compensation, protection of action in due conduct of duties by advocates, protection from illegal arrests, and the formation of grievance redressal committees. Advocate K C Mittal is representing this committee in court and advocate Nagendra Kumar is its chairman.
'Now we are going to get to see the bill…this will be the future of lawyers' safety. This was long overdue. We put in a lot of effort to prepare the draft,' said Mittal, who helped the committee draft the bill.
He also told The Indian Express that Rajasthan is the only state in the country which has enacted a law granting protection to advocates.
In Delhi's courts, news of assaults on advocates surface now and then, making the Bill a ubiquitous demand. Some of them are listed below.
• In October, Saket Court Bar Association members held a strike to protest an alleged attack on advocates in a nursery near Qutub Metro station.
• In July 2023, around eight-ten shots were fired inside Tis Hazari Court by two groups of lawyers after an argument broke out between them over parking space and misuse of the bar's funds.
• Advocate Virender Kumar, 51, who practised in Dwarka Court, was shot dead by two assailants on a bike in Dwarka Sector 1 in April last year. In the same month, shots were fired at a woman in Saket Court premises by a suspended lawyer.
• Two armed men posing as lawyers killed gangster Jitender Maan alias Gogi inside a courtroom in Rohini before being gunned down by police personnel in October 2021.
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