Odisha bar up in arms against Practitioners act

CUTTACK: The Odisha State Bar Council has vehemently opposed the Legal Practitioners (regulation and maintenance of standards in profession, protecting the interest of clients and promoting the Rule of Law) Act, 2010, and demanded its immediate withdrawal. Terming the proposed law that has generated quite a heat among the lawyers fraternity as draconian, the State Bar Council has contended that the law would undermine the institutions like the Bar and fuel distrust for members of the lawyers community. “The Act will defeat the very tenets of the Advocate’s Act, 1961,”  Odisha State Bar Council chairman Gopal Krushna Mohanty said here on Saturday. The Act proposes establishment of a Legal Services Board, institutionalising the system of ombudsman for dealing with the grievances and effecting a consumer panel. Raising the issue at the golden jubilee celebrations of the Bar Council, attended by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, Justices Altamas Kabir, A K Patnaik and Dipak Mishra of the Supreme Court and Chief Justice of the Odisha High Court V Goaplagowda, Mohanty said the Centre should be pressurised to withdraw the undemocratic legislation. The institution of ombudsman for handling grievances against legal professionals would rob the independence of the legal fraternity and hence should be fought tooth and nail. The Legal Services Board would also reduce the authority of the Bar Councils, Mohanty said. The Council also called upon the Government to wake up to the problems of the lawyers and institute welfare mechanisms for them. The  Advocates’ Welfare Fund created by the Bar Council in the State received no support from the Government, Mohanty said.