Following the Bombay high court’s decision not to allow law officers employed by the civic body to practice as advocates in courts, the BMC faces a huge challenge to contest about 60,000 cases that are pending in various courts. The civic body has decided to challenge the decision in the Apex Court.
According to the data available with the civic law department, there are more than 30,000 cases pending in the small causes court, metropolitan magistrate and an industrial court. Apart from this, 9,000 cases and 15,000 cases are pending in the city civil court and the high court respectively. In addition to this, cases related to illegal construction, encroachments, property tax disputes, public interest litigations are being added to the kitty every year.
To deal with these cases, the BMC had made ward-wise appointments of advocates from the law department. There were in all 90 law officers, who were representing the BMC in various courts. However, the high court’s decision has now put a question mark over the civic body’s ability to deal with these cases.
According to the provision in the Advocates Act framed by the Bar Council of India (BCI), the apex governing body of lawyers, full-timed salaried employees cannot practise as lawyers in courts.
The prohibition is to protect the independent autonomy of advocates as a member of the legal profession. An exception was made to allow the BMC and the government law officers to represent the BMC and the state in courts. However, the BCI deleted the exception earlier this year.