Mention advocates and the first thing that strikes the common man is top lawyers who charge hefty fees and move around in expensive vehicles.
With a similar aspiration, Radhika Giri, 28, had left her home in Assam five years ago to study law at Delhi University.
In November last year, she established a small office in south Delhi’s posh Lajpat Nagar for her legal practice.
But in less than four months, her dream of becoming a successful lawyer came crashing down, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the 21-day nationwide lockdown in March to stymie the Covid-19 infection spread.
Soon, the judiciary — from the Supreme Court to the lowest sessions courts — decided that the judges would hear only extremely urgent matters, and that would be done through video-conferencing.
“In the beginning, I thought the lockdown would be a temporary phase and things would be normal. But soon, I realised the Covid-19 situation was getting worse which forced the government to extend the lockdown. The trial courts, where I practice, were shut on March 23 and are yet to resume their normal functioning,” Radhika says.
With hardly any client approaching her, Radhika shut her office in September as she could no longer pay the rent for the premise.
The 28-year-old is now packing her things up and is likely to return to Assam to stay with her family.
“The present clients I had refused to pay me advance stating that there was hardly any hearing in the trial courts, and they are not getting any relief as well,” Radhika says.
The young lawyer has no plans to come back until the Covid-19 situation improves in the national capital and courts resume their full-fledged functioning.
Even though the Supreme Court and high courts across the country are conducting virtual hearings, the trial courts — where most lawyers practice — are still not working properly and are hearing only urgent matters.
Many lawyers complain that they lack proper infrastructure at home to attend virtual hearings and don’t have gadgets such as laptops, scanners, good wifi connectivity for better bandwidth. Another problem that lawyers facing are regarding payment from clients.
While most of them don’t want to meet personally, some fear that the digital payment could be risky.
Despite several bar associations of Delhi courts comprising thousands of lawyers, the government is hesitant on opening up the courts fearing the footfall on the court premises could lead to further spread coronavirus infection.
The digital hearing has come with a heavy price for those who were dependent on everyday hearings for their income, especially the lawyers who are just starting their career. Several state bar councils have come forward to help such lawyers monetarily.
A study by the New Delhi-based legal think-tank Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, released in May, found that, according to 79 per cent of 2,800 lawyers surveyed at eight high courts, advocates with up to two years of legal practice earn less than Rs 10,000 a month.
Eighty per cent of the Delhi High Court lawyers surveyed said the average monthly income in the first two years of practice could be between Rs 5,000 and Rs 20,000.
According to a Bar Council of India (BCI), there are around 16 lakh advocates enrolled with different state bar councils.
These advocates are solely dependent on the regular, though meagre, income they earn from appearing in different courts and various tribunals as well as before the quasi-judicial authorities.
The Delhi Bar Council had released Rs 8 crore to 1,600 lawyers, besides providing financial support to advocates and family members suffering from Covid-19.
Additionally, the council has decided to pay families compensation of Rs 1 lakh in case a lawyer dies due to the infection. Similar funds have been created by several bar councils across the country, including the Karnataka State Bar Council, the Bar Council of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry and the Bar Council of Assam, Nagaland, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim.
‘Planning to change profession’
For 42-year-old Pankaj Pandey and his wife Surbhi, both working advocates at Delhi courts, the pandemic has hit the couple so badly that they had to leave their rented accommodation in Dwarka and shift to their hometown in Gaya, Bihar.
“We knew that the lockdown would mean zero income for us. There was also less possibility that the courts would resume functioning soon. And since my wife was expecting our first child, I didn’t want to take any risk. I returned to Gaya with my wife in August with all our belongings. I am now thinking of switching my profession for our livelihood. If the situation improves, I will return to Delhi,” Pankaj said.
Letter to Prime Minister
On 10 July, the Bar Council of Delhi had written to Modi, demanding an allocation of Rs 500 crore from the Contingency Fund of India as well as the PM CARES “to mitigate their hardships”.
In a letter to the PM, the council has said that “the condition of advocates has been worsening day by day forcing them to find even basic requirements being unmet”.
Around 2,000 women advocates from across the country have also written a letter to the Home Minister Amit Shah, explaining the financial stress that they are undergoing and urged him to improve the infrastructure in courts so that virtual courts can function smoothly.
The Bar Council of Delhi has also written to the Chief Justice of the High Court, urging him to allow a hybrid system of hearings, where the judges physically assemble in courtrooms and then let the lawyers decide if they wish to opt for virtual or physical hearings.
The letter by BCD member Rajiv Khosla states: “The hybrid mode will not give any excuse to anyone for non-appearance in their case, citing the difficulty of causing appearance in a particular mode. This will further empower the presiding officer to pass effective orders after hearing both the parties and the same will also reduce the pendency in future besides providing some monetary relief to the lawyers who are hard-pressed on account of the same.”
Similar ordeal for CAs
These are testing times for chartered accountants (CA) as well, as the footfall of clients has drastically fallen due to fewer business transactions.
Rishan Sharma, 35, a CA who has his own firm, says his client base has come down to 50 per cent and has also streamlined his workforce of 10 people to just three, including him.
“With the government keeps on extending the deadline for filing the income tax of working professionals, most people are not very keen on filing their returns soon. Moreover, many clients have lost their jobs or have faced pay cuts. So, most of them are either not filing their returns or doing that on their own this year,” Rishan says, adding that GST filings have also slashed as many businesses were shut during the lockdown and had no sale purchase.
Himanshu Gupta, a company secretary, is combating a similar problem.
“My work is mostly related to managing company affairs and finances, but with this pandemic, most of my clients — who were running their start-ups — have closed their businesses and are looking for other jobs. I am just left with two firms who are still functional and need my assistance. But they are not enough to meet monthly requirements,” Gupta says, adding that he had also applied for a job but did not receive a positive response from the employer.
Like the lawyers, many CA and CS, who had been operating from rented premises, have vacated them and are preferring to work from home.
“I had a big rented office space in Rajendra Place and got the interior done in December last year. But, I had to vacate it this August as my client base has drastically fallen. Now, I am operating from my home so that maximum expenses can be curtailed,” Ravi Malhotra, a chartered accountant, says.
Trial courts lawyers worst hit
Even though the Supreme Court and high courts across the country are conducting virtual hearings, the trial courts — where most lawyers practice — are still not working properly and are hearing only urgent matters.
Many lawyers complain that they lack proper infrastructure at home to attend virtual hearings and don’t have gadgets such as laptops, scanners, good wifi connectivity for better bandwidth.
The government is hesitant on opening up the courts fearing the footfall on the court premises could lead to further spread coronavirus infection
First Covid-19 death among SC staffers
A Supreme Court administration branch member has died due to the novel coronavirus, an official said Sunday, confirming the first Covid-19 death among the country’s top court staffers.
The apex court has been hearing matters through video conferencing since March 23, two days before a national lockdown was imposed to restrict the spread of coronavirus.
An apex court official said Rajendra Rawat, who died on Saturday, was with the Supreme Court’s administration department and had tested positive for Covid-19 five days back.
Rawat, who was around 50, is survived by his spouse and three children, he said.
(All the names have been changed to protect identity)