E-Paper
ABA election: Lawyers move SC against HC’s Lucknow bench decision
Awadh Bar Association elections held on August 14 were cancelled by returning officer due to alleged misconduct of lawyers
The Allahabad high court’s Lucknow bench order regarding election of the Awadh Bar Association of the high court has been challenged in the Supreme Court. Earlier this week, lawyers Amit Sachan and Alok Tripathi filed a Special Leave Petition (SLP) in the Supreme Court challenging the high court’s August 24 and 27 order cancelling the election process and imposing some restrictions while conducting election of the Awadh Bar Association afresh.
The petitioners have pointed out that once the Bar Council of India and Bar Council of Uttar Pradesh have verified credential of advocates and issued certificate of practice (CoP), how can a lawyer be barred from contesting election or casting vote in the bar association election of which he/she is a member.
The Awadh Bar Association elections held on August 14 were cancelled by the returning officer due to the alleged misconduct of lawyers. A division bench of Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi and Justice Dinesh Kumar Singh took suo motu cognizance of the incident on August 16. The high court on August 24 cancelled the entire election process of the ABA and issued a set of guidelines for conducting fresh election on September 25.
Hearing a recall application on August 27, the court relaxed guidelines issued by it for the ABA election. The court relaxed conditions of becoming a valid voter and issued new guidelines for it.
Guidelines for ABA polls
-The period of three years to be reduced to two years (for listing of cases)
-Minimum cases filed in a year for last two years will be 10 cases for 2019 and five cases for the year 2020
-Lawyers whose houses are on Lucknow-Barabanki road or in colonies on the Lucknow-Barabanki road will be treated as residents of Lucknow
-Advocate-Oath Commissioners shall be treated as regular practitioners
-All the chamber allottees will be included in the definition of regular practitioner.
