No more Britisher ‘lordships’, P&H bar to call judges ‘your honour’

Friday, 8 April 2011 By Legally India Bar, Bench & Litigation

The Punjab and Haryana Bar Association (PHBA) has resolved to dispense with the practice of addressing judges as “my lord” or “your lordship” because of the terms’ colonial associations, substituting the more liberal American title “your honour”.

PHBA is the second bar association to have passed such a resolution after the lawyer’s body of Kerala High Court unanimously decided to ban usage of the contentious title in 2007.

PHBA president Kulbir Singh Dhaliwal told media that all 4,500 bar association members had consented to endorse the Bar Council of India (BCI) resolution which was passed in 2006 for bringing about this change.

“The BCI, the apex body of lawyers in the country, had adopted a resolution in April 2006 and added a new rule 49(1)(j) in the Advocates’ Act. According to the rule, lawyers can address the court as ‘your honour’ and refer to it as ‘honourable court’. If it is a subordinate court, lawyers can use terms such as ‘sir’ or any equivalent phrase in the regional language,” reported the Times of India.

Photo by a.drian

Comments

Anonymous guest 9 Apr 2011, 08:22

+1 -0

Very commendable, very commendable but it would be more useful to litigants if these bar associations resolved to be better versed in law, not mislead clients, stop paying off court staff to fast forward their cases and all the other crap that goes on in the name of practice of law.

Litigants dont give a rat's arse whether the judge is called my lord or my servant. We still think renaming the roads will make traffic move faster.

Anonymous guest 9 Apr 2011, 08:32

+0 -0

hold the ear for this way or that way means same !

Anonymous guest 9 Apr 2011, 18:54

How dare these Indians do that ? Its been only 60 years we have left ? "fume" .... lol

lex suprema 11 Apr 2011, 13:18

+0 -1

Wot a joke these Indian can crack. We can goon with out head held high with a blended and lended Constitution, we can adopt the mojor laws from them, we can adopt the justice providing system from them, we can say that since their bar exam is held so here also we should copy it,We feel it a matter of pride to be a part of the commonwealth.
But
we r anguished and feel that our self respect is hurt when we say 'My Lord'

Anyway we Indian cant leave our habit of coping if its not UK the US. US has not ruled us, whipped us, kicked us, so we can copy them. WE DO NOT HAVE ORIGINALITY SINCE FROM THE DAYS OF CONSTI. Wish they have ever looked into our rich scriptures.

Anonymous guest 11 Apr 2011, 17:53

#4: you are very right my friend...if we are not borrowing anything from UK, why borrow from the US??? we should not even use your honour..we should come out with an original/Indian way of addressing the judges...i suggest bhai saab/sirjee/janaab will be a good and cultured way of addressing the honourable judges :P

lex suprema 12 Apr 2011, 00:23

well...that was a v good joke Mr #5.... We Indian have only one problem that i can see...and that is lack of respect for own language and culture and traditions. Vivekanada in the 1st world congress of religion his 1st address to the hall was " brothers and sisters of america" rather then gm. and for 15 min the hall was filled with the roar of applaud.
Wish i could ever made u see the rich naya shastras and law od evidences which he had in ancien India and also wish i cold mk the framers of indian Consti peruse it.

Anonymous guest 13 Apr 2011, 17:00

@ 4 - If you take good things from a system, does that mean that you should also take the unimportant or unnecessary things from that. Btw, I personally do no take pride to be a part of the commonwealth nation !!

lex suprema 14 Apr 2011, 00:04

#7 yes ur right....we have always been open to everything...but the thing is that the thing we r thinking of taking sh be better from what we already have

Anonymous guest 14 Apr 2011, 18:29

Manu Smriti lacks gender equality.

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