The Bar Council of India (BCI) has stayed its order of 24 July that had suspended, without notice or due process, 126 Tamil Nadu advocates who had allegedly been involved in the strikes against the Madras high court’s controversial new disciplinary rules.

Jindal Global Law School (JGLS) Sonepat and the Indiana University Center on the Global Legal Profession is hosting a very interesting panel discussion today, which I intend to live blog here.

The Calcutta high court on 26 July dismissed the second appeal of NUJS Kolkata registrar Surajit Mukhopadhyay against his suspension from the post by the vice-chancellor (VC), clearing the way for his dismissal by the university.

Bar Council of India (BCI) chairman Manan Kumar Mishra was interviewed by The Hindu a few days ago about the Bar Council of India (BCI) decision to suspend 126 lawyers from Tamil Nadu for allegedly protesting against controversial disciplinary rules passed by the Madras high court.

In May 2010, then-prime minister Manmohan Singh made a few headlines by saying what nearly every lawyer and educator in the country knew to be true: he called Indian legal education a “sea of institutionalised mediocrity”, dotted with a few “islands of excellence”.

Delhi Police has filed three separate chargesheets accusing three lawyers and suspended BJP legislator OP Sharma of the violence in the Patiala House Courts complex in February.

“The Supreme Court…has asked the Law Commission to go into all relevant aspects relating to regulation of legal profession in consultation with all concerned…the Commission has undertaken the study and requests the Bar Council of India and all State Bar Councils, Bar Association of the Supreme Court and Advocates on Records Association of Supreme Court, Advocates Associations’ in the High Courts and their respective benches to send their comments within 30 days,” the Law Commission has said in a statement.

“The Central Information Commission has directed the Bar Council of Delhi to proactively make public the cases of professional misconduct, both proved and not proved, against advocates at regular intervals or as and when the decision was taken,”.

If you believe those Supreme Court judges who say that the CBI is a caged parrot, then it might be fair to also assume that the Modi regime does not have much love lost for the Bar Council of India (BCI).

Bar Council of India (BCI) associate managing trustee Rajinder Singh Rana, former BCI vice chairman Raju Dhanpal Raj and ex-BCI-member Milan Kumar Dey have been sentenced to five years imprisonment and a fine for taking a Rs 6 lakh bribe to approve Global Law College in Ghaziabad.

Eight out of 12 bar councils do not have a single female member, making for an average female representation of 2.8 per cent amongst the bar councils for which data was available, revealed our research.

The Society of Indian Law Firms (Silf) meeting held in Delhi yesterday (11 July) to discuss its response and position to the Government proposal to liberalise the legal market, has seen the body set up a high-powered committee without any fundamental disagreements voiced about the next steps to take, according to several people who were present.

“Legal education needs to be improved and the Bar Council of India needs to reform itself,” Law Commission chairman and retired Supreme Court judge Balbir Singh Chauhan told the Economic Times in an exclusive interview.

A Supreme Court bench of justices Anil R Dave, Kurian Joseph and Adarsh Kumar Goel yesterday asked the Law Commission to consider whether the Bar Council of India (BCI) is a suitable regulator of the legal profession within six months.

Communications and Information Technology minister and lawyer Ravi Shankar Prasad has been made the law minister again in today’s cabinet reshuffle, replacing DV Sadananda Gowda, reported DNA and others.

This morning’s hotly anticipated meeting between government ministries and several non-governmental organisations, including the Society of Indian Law Firms (Silf) and the Bar Council of India (BCI), passed without any principled resistance by stakeholders to the allowing foreign lawyers to practice in India.

The liberalisation process might never have been as advanced, but it remains a process fraught with sensitivity.

The Supreme Court granted another extension of three months to all state bar councils last week, which have been struggling to complete verification of lawyers under the Bar Council of India (BCI) (Certificate of Practice) Rules.

The Bar Council of India (BCI) has drafted rules to allow foreign lawyers to practice in India, with the law and justice ministry having invited other ministries and three other organisations to discuss the proposals on Tuesday (5 July).

A South Korean citizen who graduated from JGLS Sonepat last year is facing a dead end at the Bar Council of India (BCI), on her application to take the All India Bar Exam (AIBE). She took admission to JGLS relying on the reciprocity clause in the Advocates Act 1961.