Unbecoming of one who dons silk to address court in such manner: Madhya Pradesh High Court censures Senior Counsel

The Madhya Pradesh High Court on Thursday took serious exception to a retort made by Senior Advocate Mrigendra Singh calling for the recusal of a judge and alleging bias on his part [Prakash Singh and Nandita Singh v. State of MP and anr]..Justice Atul Sreedharan observed that a designation as Senior Advocate was not for one’s vast knowledge, erudition, articulation and legal acumen alone, but the court's acknowledgement of the lawyer's poise, patience and most importantly, extreme grace.“It is unbecoming of a person who dons silk to address the court in such a manner as has happened today only because he feels that the court does not agree with his submissions,” the order stated..The incident occurred when the High Court was hearing a plea seeking quashing of a first information report (FIR) registered for the offence of cheating by the first petitioner’s sister, arising from a dispute relating to the ancestral property of their late father.The complainant had claimed that the petitioner gave her seven cheques, all of which were dishonoured. Thus, she registered a criminal case against her brother and his wife.On examining whether a cheque bounced on account of closure of account could constitute an offence under the Indian Penal Code, the Court noted that it was a well-settled principle of law that general law would not prevail over special law like the Negotiable Instruments Act.Thus, the registration of this case was apparently malicious and deserved to be quashed, the Court held..The petitioners brought to the Court’s attention that the complainant’s husband was a senior police officer, and there was a possibility that the FIR was registered under his influence.While hearing arguments in this regard, the Court observed that where the police was reluctant to register an FIR when a poor man with a genuine grievance approaches the police station, its registration in a case such as this one was “rather unthinkable.”.Senior Advocate Singh, however, took exception to this observation, and alleged bias on the part of the Court.“This Court takes great umbrage to the conduct of the senior counsel who has cast aspersions on the neutrality of the Court without adequate cause,” the judge stated.The order recorded that the Senior Counsel interrupted Justice Sreedharan and did not allow him to complete the observation that in comparison to other states, the State of Madhya Pradesh was better and the tendency of burking crime rates was far lesser.The judge refused to recuse from hearing the matter, and condemned the conduct and the words used by the Senior Advocate in the strongest possible terms..Justice Sreedharan said that he found it essential to place this order before the Chairman of the Madhya Pradesh State Bar Council with a request to take the strictest possible action against the Senior Counsel for his “intemperate and unpardonable conduct”..The Court considered that perhaps precious little would be done since Singh was an officer-bearer of the Bar Council.“The action taken will be a moment of truth, not just for the institutions of the Bar and the Bench, but to the people of this state with regard to the extent to which the Bar Council is willing to go in order to bring in line the erring members in the profession.”.The action taken will be a moment of truth, not just for the institutions of the Bar and the Bench, but to the people of this State.Justice Atul Sreedharan.With this, the petition was allowed and a copy of the order was directed to be sent to the Chairman of the State Bar Council, with a request for action as deemed fit and proper by the Council..Senior Advocate Surendra Singh with Advocates Simon Benjamin and Sivam Singh appeared for the petitioners, while the respondents were represented by Senior Advocate Singh, Government Advocate AS Pathak, and Advocate Guncha Rasool..[Read Order]