The Bar Council Of India has almost reached the completion of it’s lawyers verification drive, an initiative it took to cut down the number of uncertified or fake lawyers practicing law, and the results are pretty grim.
According to a report in Times of India, almost 45 percent of the lawyers currently present in the legal system failed to show proper certification.
BCI chief Manan Kumar Mishra told a group of of senior Supreme Court judges and the Chief Justice Of India that they had only received 6.6 lakh applications for verification out of the 14 lakh officially enrolled lawyers in India.
The BCI’s verification drive was lauded by the Chief Justice, who said the lawyers practicing with fake degrees or no degrees needed to be weeded out.
When the Certificate and Place of Practice (Verification) Rules were announced last year, many were critical of the the move.
Organisations such as the Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association (SCAORA) had even demanded an exemption from the verification for designated senior advocates and advocates-on-record.
Feature Image Source: PTI