This Senior Advocate has challenged Supreme Court criteria for Chamber Allotment

Senior Advocate V Mohana has moved the Supreme Court assailing the cut-off date prescribed by the Supreme Court as a criterion for allotment of lawyer’s chamber.

In a petition filed through advocate Sriram P, Mohana has prayed that the cut-off date of June 30, 2016 prescribed by the Supreme Court be extended to fulfil the regularity of practice requirement which is what the Supreme Court Lawyers’ Chambers (Allotment and Occupancy) Rules (Allotment Rules) seek to achieve.

Mohana enrolled as an advocate in the year 1988. She became an Advocate-on-Record (AoR) of the Supreme Court in the year 1996 and was designated Senior Advocate on April 23, 2015.

The genesis of the controversy lies in a notice issued by the Additional Registrar of the Administrative General Branch of the Supreme Court on October 31, 2017 inviting applications for allotment of lawyers’ chamber.

The condition prescribed by the notice was that the concerned Senior Advocate should be regularly practicing in Supreme Court and must have a minimum of fifty appearances each year for any two years between June 1, 2011 and June 30, 2016.

Aggrieved by the same, the petitioner had made a representation to the Registrar/ Chamber Allotment Committee seeking a date closer to the date of application as the cut-off date.

Subsequently, on May 16, 2018, a new notice was issued but the above eligibility conditions were reiterated in the new notice as well. This has led to the current petition.

It is the petitioner’s case that the object of the two-year condition is to test the regularity of practice of the concerned lawyer. But the cut-off date of June 2016 for a notice issued in October 2017 would mean that it would be impossible for the petitioner to fulfil the same, since she was designated Senior Advocate only in April 2015.

Mohana has submitted that the Allotment Rules seek regularity of practice to ensure that the chambers are allotted only to lawyers who are primarily, regularly and actively practicing before the Supreme Court.

This test of regularity is independent of the criterion under which a lawyer applies for a chamber. It is her submission that there is no requirement under the rules that the regularity of practice has to be shown in the specific category in which a lawyer applies. In short, regularity of practice is court-specific under the rules rather than criterion/role specific.

Mohana has stated that she has more than adequate appearances as required by the notice and fulfils all the criteria mentioned in the notice if her appearances as AoR is considered. Further, she will have more than adequate appearances as Senior Advocate if the cut-off date is aligned with the date of notice or date of application.

However, since she was designated Senior Advocate only in April 2015, she has become a victim of the anomaly created by the arbitrary cut-off date, the petition states.

She has contended there is no discernible and reasonable purpose in keeping the cut-off date far removed from the date of notice and it has no nexus to the object sought to be achieved.

Alleging the same to be arbitrary and ultra-vires the Allotment Rules, Mohana has prayed that the cut-off date be extended so as to fulfil the regularity of practice requirement in Allotment Rules. Alternatively, she has sought quashing of the notice issued by the Supreme Court on May 16, 2018.

This would be the third petition concerning chamber allotment in Supreme Court.

A similar petition has been filed by Advocate-on-Record Anirudh Sanganeria raising the very same issue regarding cut-off date prescribed for AoRs.

Further, another petition challenging Rule 7B of the Allotment Rules is also pending in Supreme Court. Under the said Rule, in the event of death of a lawyer who has a chamber in Supreme Court, the chamber will be allotted to his/her son, daughter or spouse if such person is practicing in the Supreme Court.