A two year old verification process carried out by the Bar Council of India has indicated that the number of fake lawyers across the country may be roughly around 45 per cent of the total.
According to a Times of India report, earlier this week, BCI chief Manan Kumar Mishra announced before Chief Justice of India J S Khehar and other senior Supreme Court judges that its ongoing verification drive had already cut the number of genuine lawyers to 55-60 per cent.
“The number of practicing lawyers is about to come down to 55-60% after the completion of the verification process. This will certainly improve the quality of our legal profession,” Mishra was quoted by Times of India as saying.
“As per the 2012 election statistics of BCI, we had almost 14 lakh voters, but since this verification process has started, we have received only 6.5 lakh applications,” he added.
Voters are lawyers enrolled with various State Bar Councils to practice law in respective trial courts and the state’s high court.
CJI Khehar said that he is happy that BCI has started the verification process and that it is not only about people with fake degrees, but also those who have no degrees.
He added that such people go to court and work without any authority.
Khehar further urged BCI to train young lawyers to make them understand the profession and its work ethics and the apex lawyers’ body to improve the quality of legal institutions by training and helping litigants and making the lawyers competent enough to discharge their obligations towards the society.
