NEW DELHI, Feb 20 : A day after the Supreme Court rebuked a lawyer who sought adjournment citing senior advocate Harish Salve’s unavailability in appearing in the matter, the senior counsel informed the top court on Thursday that the request was made on his behalf without his knowledge.
A bench of Justices A S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan was informed by a lawyer from Salve’s office that it was very unfair to the court that he was not intimated at all about it.
Justice Oka said there would be no harm if an apology was tendered to the court by the lawyers.
“You may not like judges but there is no harm in apologising to the institution. You may not like an individual judge but even that remorse is not shown by junior members of the bar. That will be harmful to them in the future. The apology has to be to the institution and not to the individual judges. And even that practice has disappeared with the passage of time because perhaps the junior members of the bar are under the impression that judges may come here stay for few years and go away,” he said.
The senior advocate, the lawyer said, was not kept in the loop that such an adjournment was sought.
“We are not on individuals. It is very unfair. This is not the first time,” the bench added.
When the court asked the lawyer what action should be taken against the lawyer who took adjournment in Salve’s name, the advocate appearing from Salve’s office said, “One thing we were taught repeatedly was never take the court for granted. That it is your temple, that is where you have to appear and that is where you have to bow down. There are people who are doing things in his (Salve’s) name and he is aggrieved that he does not even get to know about it and people go and mention on his behalf.”
The counsel who sought the adjournment on February 19 appeared before the bench and said he was acting on the client’s instructions. The lawyer asked the court to adjourn the matter for four weeks, saying Salve would argue the matter.
The top court then expressed its disapproval.
“Are you under an impression that we will adjourn a matter if you take the name of a senior counsel? This tendency of the lawyers at the bar must stop. We are not going to adjourn matters just because you take the name of any senior counsel,” it said.
When the matter later came up for hearing, the court said it wanted to dispel the impression that it could adjourn the matter in the name of a senior counsel.
However, it accepted the request and adjourned the hearing. (PTI)
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