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On 2 July, the Bar Council of India invited comments from the stakeholders of the newly proposed draft Advocates Protection Bill.
As per the press release, the BCI has directed the circulation of the draft Bill to all Bar Council and Bar associations. All stakeholders have been requested to give their inputs within a week's time or before 9 July 2021, by writing to advprotectionbill.bci@gmail.com.
The draft Advocates Protection Bill is aimed at ensuring adequate protection to members of the legal fraternity so that they can carry on their duties as officers of the court fearlessly, without having to worry about their and their family's safety.
In the press release, concerns raised regarding the risks faced by lawyers and inadequate legal measures in place to protect them have been reiterated.
The objective of the Bill is to ensure greater protection of advocates and their functions in discharge of their professional duties.
As per the Bill, whoever commits or abets the commission of an act of violence (other than grievous hurt) against an advocate will face punishment of imprisonment of minimum 6 months and maximum 5 years. That person will also have to pay a fine of minimum Rs 50,000 and maximum Rs 1 lakh.
The draft Bill has been created on the recommendations of a 7-member committee consisting of the following members:
Senior Advocate S Prabakaran, Vice-Chairman, Bar Council of India;
Senior Advocate Debi Prasad Dhal, Executive Chairman, Bar Council of India Trust;
Advocate Suresh Chandra Shrimali, Co-Chairman, Bar Council of India;
Advocate Shailendra Dubey, Member, Bar Council of India;
Advocate A Rami Reddy, Executive Vice-Chairman, Bar Council of India Trust;
Advocate Shreenath Tripathi, Member, Bar Council of India; and
Advocate Prashant Kumar Singh, Member, Bar Council of India.
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