The government has moved for an early hearing in the Bar Council of India (BCI) AK Balaji appeal in the Supreme Court, reported Bar & Bench.

Legal services are not exempt from payment of Goods and Services Tax (GST) applicable on them, under the GST’s reverse charge mechanism, the government clarified on Saturday, 15 July.

Bar council rules directing lawyers to explain the quantum and manner of charging fee for a particular case, would safeguard the interest of poor litigants from remote hilly areas, ruled the Uttarakhand high court, the Times of India reported.

The Calcutta high court, which is currently short of of 38 judges and is facing the retirement of 10 more by February, warned the government that “appropriate action” will be taken against it if the judicial vacancies were not filled on priority, reported News18.

Supreme Court ready to go paperless? Not yet The Supreme Court Advocates on Record Association (SCAORA) yesterday told the Supreme Court registrars that the Supreme Court’s new case management system (ICMIS) should only be allowed to run parallel to the old system of manual filing, as the new system...

The Supreme Court Advocates on Record Association (SCAORA) will get a lesson from the Supreme Court in the use of the new Integrated Case Management and Information System (ICMIS) intended to allow full e-filing at the apex court, in a series of demonstrations organised from this Monday (10 July).

The Bar Council of India (BCI) denied a right to information (RTI) request for the meeting minutes and reasons for its unexpected decision to yet again increase the bar exam fees by another 40 per cent.

Janhavi Gadkar, the Reliance Industries in-house lawyer who had allegedly killed two passengers of another car while ramming into it while drunk in 2015, has been permitted to visit Europe for tourism, relaxing her bail condition, reported Sadaf Modak in The Indian Express.

Law Commission member and senior advocate Abhay Bhardwaj, who practices in Gujarat, has invited Gujarat’s district bar associations to submit suggestions by July 2, related to the proposed amendment to the Advocates Act 1961, reported DNA India.

The Bar Council of India (BCI) has notified the 12th qualifying exam for Indian nationals holding foreign law degrees to be held from 26 June to 1 July, 10 months after the 11th edition of this exam was held.

Nearly every lawyer (particularly in Delhi) has their story to tell about how after a bit of drink driving or minor traffic violations, they managed to escape a fine by waving their advocates license at a traffic cop.

Supreme Court Justice Dipak Misra wrote a 192-word opening sentence in an order in 2015, to say that the case before him was a frivolous litigation filed to harass and arm-twist the opposing party into agreeing to an out-of-court settlement. Justice Misra’s frustration with the case, however, was particularly linked to the rampant abuse of a procedural provision.

The Delhi Judicial Services (DJS) exam result is facing another long delay, this time of at least 10 months, keeping with previous years’ trends. The last DJS exam, which is the first phase to qualify for interviews to join Delhi’s lower judiciary, was held by 10 July 2016.

Khaitan & Co’s Calcutta partners and some of the firm’s current and one former associate have been summoned by the Calcutta high court to respond to perjury and criminal contempt allegations made against them by advocate Deepak Khosla on behalf of his client.

Law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said today that the government had not yet taken a decision on the Law Commission proposals to overhaul the regulation of the legal profession, which included the banning of lawyer strikes and induction of non-elected, non-lawyer members into bar councils.

As Bar Council of India (BCI) chairman Manan Kumar Mishra today said the national strike was a resounding success in a Facebook post (including the praising of Law Commission-report burnings), it is worth bearing in mind the cost of lawyer strikes on the judicial system.

Bombay high court Justice Gautam Patel has awarded a “reasonable” Rs 184 in costs on a petitioner because the date was 18 April (18.4) on the day of the order, after he was unconvinced by a lawyer’s counterarguments against a permission to refile a case.

Tamil Nadu-based advocate K Muthuramalingam won an undertaking from the state bar council last week in his Madras high court writ petition against the call for nationwide strikes by the Bar Council of India (BCI) and its chairman Manan Kumar Mishra.

Lawyer strikes are fuelled by lawyers who hardly have court work and also by bar councils who guard their vote bank and disregard the interests of justice, as even elite law schools have failed in their mission, said Law Commission (LC) chairman and former Supreme Court judge Justice BS Chauhan in an interview with Outlook magazine, demonstrating a pretty decent understanding of the legal profession and some of the problems that beset it.