Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are estimated to have 40 to 50 advocates who entered the profession on the basis of fake law degrees and are not actively practising for obvious reasons. Bar Council of India (BCI) Chairman Manan Kumar Mishra speaking at a lawyers meeting organised by the council in Chennai said the 30 per cent of the lawyers in India were holding fraudulent law degrees. Apparently the percentage of lawyers having fake law degrees is higher than that.
Their credentials are not investigated unless there are complaints and verification of their certificates is a difficult thing as past records have to be looked into. However, if an advocate is found to possess a fake certificate, he or she can be permanently disqualified.
The historic Bezawada Bar Association (BBA) had four or five such fake advocates who are not seen for obvious reasons. BBA president Ch.S.V. Jagadeeswara Rao told The Hindu that there was a chance of advocates claiming to have passed law at places other than cities / towns where they appear to be practising, being dubious ones but only a proper verification would reveal facts.
For scrutiny to be done, somebody has to make a complaint, when police come into the picture.
The essence of it is that such fake advocates virtually hide themselves from the mainstream and as discussed earlier, there are procedural issues to be dealt with to rein them in, Mr. Rao noted.
Non-practising advocates
The number of non-practising advocates is huge at about 50 per cent of the nearly 60,000 advocates in both the States.
All of them are duly registered with the respective Bar Councils and Bar Associations but do not have the wherewithal to sustain in the profession.
BBA has, for instance, about 3,300 members and only 1,200 to 1,500 are active practising. Of them, only up to 600 attend courts regularly.
The remaining do their businesses and other things unrelated to their basic job of a legal practitioner.
Certain policy changes were recommended to bring in an element of discipline but have not found favour with the legal fraternity.
