Only one round of Senior Designations in last 8 years; be liberal this time in conferring gown: SCBA to Supreme Court

The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) has written to the Chief Justice of India (CJI) and other judges of the Supreme Court requesting that a liberal approach should be adopted while designating deserving and meritorious advocates as Senior Advocates during the upcoming round of designations..The association emphasized that due to a judicial challenge, coupled with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the senior designation process happned only once in the last eight years.It, therefore, appealed that the Court should not be dissuaded from conferring the senior gown on meritorious and deserving candidates only due to the large number of applications in the current round of designations. “It is evident that in the last 8 years, the designation process has been done only once. It is for this reason that a large number of 355 Advocates have applied for designation in the current round,” the letter explained..Notably, Section 16 of the Advocates Act, which lays down two classes of advocates, was challenged in the Supreme Court in the case of Indira Jaising vs Union of India in 2015. The matter remained pending until 2017 before the Court upheld the constitutionality of the provision while laying down objective criteria for the designation of Senior Advocates. Owing to the pendency of this petition, the designation process was kept in abeyance for several years.After the judgment, the process was initiated again in 2018. The 2018 process concluded in 2019. Thereafter, owing to the pandemic, the Senior Advocate designation process was not initiated for four years. It was initiated again only on February 25, 2022, the SCBA noted. "Similarly, the current process of designation is also taking place after a long gap of almost 4 years and only second in last 8 years. It is, therefore, respectfully prayed that this Hon’ble Court should be liberal in designating meritorious and deserving candidates," the SCBA appealed..The SCBA has also called attention to the decision to impose a minimum age for candidates in the recently notified criteria. As per these criteria, candidates under the age of 45 years are required to be "exceptional" to be eligible for designation. The bar body has suggested that this criterion should be applied liberally, given that it was introduced on May 12, 2023, after the process had already begun..The letter also drew parallels between the eligibility criteria for president and member appointments to Consumer Commissions and the criteria for Senior Advocate designation. The SCBA has argued that if lawyers with 10 years of experience can hold such judicial positions, they should also be eligible for designation as a Senior Advocate..[Read letter]