5 SC Judges to decide on Bar exam

Legal Correspondent

New Delhi, March 18

A five-member Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court will go into the validity Bar Council of India’s (BCI’s) All India Bar Examination (AIBE) for new lawyers and other matters to set a benchmark for lawyers.

A Bench headed by Chief Justice TS Thakur today framed three issues and referred these to the proposed larger Bench for testing BCI’s post enrolment examination in the light of the provisions of the Advocates Act 1961.

Some of the petitioners have challenged the AIBE contending that this was against the 1961 Act.

“This is a crucial issue for the entire profession and it is time to introspect. Let us raise the standard and change the present atmosphere of lawyers fighting, agitating and squabbling, with only a few of them arguing in courts,” the CJI had remarked at the last hearing on March 4.

The SC has appointed senior advocate KK Venugopal as amicus curiae in the case.

If there was need for amending the Advocates Act, the SC would ask the government to get it done by Parliament.

The petitioners pleaded that AIBE came in the way of law graduates’ right to practise law guaranteed under the Advocates Act. BCI introduced AIBE in 2010 as part of efforts to set a benchmark for practising lawyers.