Kerala High Court lawyers place wreath near escalator to protest frequent malfunctioning

Kerala High Court lawyers on Tuesday took to a rather cheeky way to protest the disrepair of the High Court building, particularly the frequent malfunctioning of the escalator.

Advocates practicing before the Court placed a floral wreath at the foot of the escalators in the eight storey building.

In fact, most visitors to the High Court attest that the escalators have seldom been operational especially in the past few years.

The peaceful yet tongue-in-cheek protest today saw former president of the Kerala High Court Advocates' Association (KHCAA) Rajesh Vijayan and another advocate placing a wreath at the base of one of the escalators.

The lawyers also folded their hands in prayer, the video of which has gone viral on lawyers' WhatsApp groups.

The High Court is presently situated in a multi-storied building right next to its old premises at Ram Mohan Palace.

Soon after the High Court complex was inaugurated in 2006, complaints regarding the alleged poor quality of construction started spreading in legal circles.

While structural repairs were carried out in 2018, troubling issues persist such as waterlogging, infrastructural shortfalls including lack of parking space and restrictive proximity to the ecologically sensitive zone of the Mangalavanam bird sanctuary.

After much back and forth on a proposal to acquire land in the suburb of Kalamassery, it seems that the State government and the High Court administration are moving forward with the construction of a new judicial city which would house a new High Court Building, hopefully with fully functioning escalators.