– Sunitha Madhavan
The recent Senior Advocate designations to Karnataka High Court has taken an ugly turn with one of the lady senior advocates Smt. Lakshmi Iyeger attacking former Advocate General of Karnataka Mr. B.V. Acharya and the administrators of few social network groups for having insinuated sexual angle to her designation.
The Karnataka High Court in November 2018 designated eighteen lawyers as Senior Advocates. There were 68 candidates before the Committee constituted by the High Court pursuant to the Judgment of the Supreme Court in Indira Jaising vs Supreme Court of India.
Immediately after the designations, several accusations of extraneous factors playing role in senior advocates designations cropped up which ultimately resulted in filing of couple of writ petitions before the High Court of Karnataka challenging the designations.
The writ petitions available with The Mint Lawyer explains alleged glaring irregularities in the designation of senior advocates.
The petition questions the manner in which young lawyer Smt. Lakhmi Iyenger got designated when she lacked even the basic requirements. As against more than 200 reported judgments of the petitioner in one case, whose application was turned down, Lakshmi Iyengar had only 8 reported judgments and absolutely no other credentials. She was however ranked at number One by the Committee.
One Senior Advocate with condition of anonymity spoke about Lakshmi’s close immediacy with a former Judge of Karnataka High Court and how the Judge appointed her as advocate for Official Liquidator when he was sitting on company matters side. Several lady advocates with excellent track record and experience were overlooked he said. The same Judge was also member of the Committee which sat till 2 am just to clear the designations since the Judge was under transfer from Karnataka High Court.
In her counter affidavit to the writ petition, Lakshmi also rebukes social network group “Daksha Legal” for allowing lecherous comments about her comportment. The documents annexed show the alleged debates on the Whatsapp group questioning her “ethical proficiency” and the administrator of the group and Mr. Tejaswi Surya, Member of Parliament condemning allegations of “casting couch” and “lacking in ethical proficiency” comments against Lakshmi.
What is shocking is the direct accusation in the counter affidavit of Lakshmi against Mr. B.V.Acharya, former Advocate General of Karnataka who is also the father of Mr. B.L.Acharya, petitioner in one of the writ petitions challenging, inter alia, her designation. Lakshmi alleges that Mr. B.V.Acharya made lewd comments on Lakshmi’s chastity saying that “she (Lakshmi) did more than what was required by granting sexual favours to ensure her designation as a senior advocate.”
Another senior lawyer severely condemned the manner in which Lakshmi reached the top position, from out 68 applicants who had excellent track record and experience. While many candidates produced hundreds of reported judgments, Books and articles to their credit, Lakshmi who mainly practiced in family courts produced only 8 (eight) reported judgments and she was ranked at number One in the list he added. This, he says was deliberately and clandestinely done by the Committee consisting of the Judge aforesaid to make sure the Full Court would not reject her candidacy at any cost.
While such shocking accusations may or may not be unfounded, the fact check conducted by ‘TheMintLawyer’ shows that applications by some of the senior most lawyers with hundreds of reported judgments were turned by the Committee and that Lakshmi was ranked at No.One position.
Every time the senior advocates designations are made, the accusations of impropriety are made and petitions are being filed in respective High Courts. However, the allegations touching “sexual favors” angle are really unfortunate.
It is high time, this superfluous class-system among the advocates fraternity is done away with once and for all.
Sunitha Madhavan
The Mint Lawyer 