Telangana HC Questions Maintainability Of PIL On Bar Council Polls
The court questioned Senior Counsel B.S. Prasad as to how the grievance would constitute public interest litigation
Hyderabad: A two judge panel of the Telangana High Court on Monday probed as to whether the conduct of elections to the Telangana State Bar Council would constitute litigation in public interest.
The panel comprising acting Chief Justice Sujoy Paul and Justice Renuka Yara were hearing for admission a Public Interest Litigation filed by Kongara Rajkumar, an advocate challenging inaction to conduct elections to State Bar Council as per Section 8A of the Advocates Act.
The said provision envisages for constitution of special committee in absence of election. The panel questioned Senior Counsel B.S. Prasad as to how the grievance would constitute public interest litigation. When the counsel proceeded to talk about the delay in the conduct of elections, acting Chief Justice Sujoy Paul pointedly told the counsel that merits will be gone into only after crossing the threshold challenge on the maintainability of PIL.
Aadesh Verma, counsel appearing for Bar Council of India in the meanwhile pointed out that Bar Council of Telangana has moved for transfer of the case to the apex court. To the uninitiated, the question of the conduct of elections to State Bar Council was earlier heard by Single Judge and the writ petition is pending.
In the said backdrop, the present PIL is filed again on the issue of failure on the part of authorities to conduct elections to the State Bar Council. The panel posted the matter for hearing on admission after 10 days.