Advocates, in addition to being professionals, are also officers of the courts and they play a vital role in the administration of justice. They are supposed to be fearless and independent in the protection of rights of the litigants, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court has observed.
Justice K. Murali Shankar observed that it was the duty of the advocates to press their client’s case to the best of their ability, while quashing a case against an advocate pending before the Judicial Magistrate in Dindigul.
The court was hearing the petition filed by advocate P. Velumani, who was named an accused in a case for offences, including trespass. The advocate was representing a party in a civil suit.
The advocate said he accompanied the advocate commissioner appointed in the case to the disputed property. The court observed that there was no material to show that the petitioner broke open the lock of the disputed property and committed house trespass.
It further said a new trend of implicating advocates as accused along with their clients with the ulterior motive of achieving the intended result immediately had been emerging. The practice had to be deprecated and condemned, the judge said.
The nature of work of an advocate was not only limited to courts and they had to visit property in dispute or the scene of occurrence to have first hand information, the judge said.
It was the duty of an advocate to accompany the advocate commissioner appointed in the cases for inspecting disputed properties and for other purposes, the court said and quashed the case pending against the advocate.
