The Advocates (Amendment) Bill, 2023, which attempts to regulate the legal profession through a single Act and seeks to combat “touts,” was approved by the Rajya Sabha on Thursday.
The amendment would help to regulate the legal profession through a single Act, the Advocates Act, 1961, according to statement of objects and reasons of the legislation.
Union Law and Justice Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal stated that the legal profession is a respectable one and that illegal activities should be dealt with forcefully in response to a discussion of the Bill in the Rajya Sabha.
The House adjourned for the day after the Bill was approved by voice vote.
The Bill stipulates that each district judge and high court judge may compile and publish a list of touts (those who find clients for solicitors in exchange for cash or other benefits).
According to the rules, those people on the list of touts won’t be allowed inside the courthouse. Any breach of this clause will result in a fine and a sentence of up to three months in jail.
In keeping with the Centre’s policy of repealing all obsolete laws or pre-independence Acts which have lost their utility, the government in consultation with the Bar Council of India has decided to repeal the Legal Practitioners Act, 1879, and to amend the Advocates Act, 1961, by incorporating the provisions of section 36 of the Legal Practitioners Act, 1879, in the Advocates Act, 1961.
As a result, there will be fewer unnecessary laws in the statute book. According to the legislation’s declaration of purposes and justifications, it will also aid in the regulation of the legal profession under a single Act, the Advocates Act of 1961.
Sujeet Kumar, a BJD member, said that the country’s practising solicitors should be listed in a unified database since doing so would enable the creation of a social benefit programme for them.
To allow them to practise without danger, he urged that the Advocate’s Protection Act be brought in.
“The court’s officers are the solicitors. The most significant parties involved in the administration of justice are the advocates, according to Kumar.
According to BJP member Vijay Pal Singh Tomar, the Bill has a clause that will ban touts from using the courts.
M. Thambidurai of the AIADMK requested that the government change the name of the Madras High Court to Tamil Nadu High Court and that all high courts also adopt state names rather than city names.
Lawyers at the Supreme Court charge between Rs 5 and Rs 50 lakh every hearing, according to YSRCP MP V Vijayasai Reddy, who called for a restriction on the costs.
Participants in the discussion included S Niranjan Reddy and V Vijayasai Reddy of the YSRCP, Ashok Bajpai of the BJP, G K Vasan of the TMC (M), and Ramji of the BSP.
