A sitting of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Law and Justice at the Madras High Court Bench campus here on Thursday, to discuss issues related to legal aid movement, witnessed some heated moments when an office-bearer of a Bar association made a loose statement that politicians concentrate only on “selection, election and collection.”
Elaborating on the comment made by him, while addressing the committee, K.P. Thiyagarajan, president of Madras High Court Madurai Bench Advocates Association (MAHAA), said that politicians first spend time on selecting the constituency from where they want to contest and then begin focussing on fighting elections. He, however, did not explain what did he mean by “collection.”
Nevertheless, taking strong exception to the remarks made by the Bar representative, Velagapalli Vara Prasada Rao, a member of the committee and a Lok Sabha MP from Tirupati, demanded an unconditional apology by stating that it was not fair on the part of a bar leader to make such remarks on a public platform. He was backed by Anirudhan Sampath, a CPI (M) MP from Kerala.
Mr. Thiagarajan refused to apologise and said: “It is my right to speak. If you want, you can give reply to my statement.” However, other members of the Bar including J. Nisha Banu, president of Women Advocates Association in the High Court Bench, expressed regret over the incident. Later, talking to The Hindu , Mr. Rao said: “It was indeed a serious issue. But they apologised.”
E.M. Sudarsana Natchiappan, the chairman of the committee, parried questions over the issue by stating: “Let us talk only about good things.” He also said the purpose of the meeting was to find out new avenues for providing legal aid to the poor, women, juveniles, Dalits, minorities, those suffering with HIV and other deprived sections of society. On the demand for renaming the Madras High Court as Tamil Nadu High Court, he said that the committee had already recommended to the Centre.
