Cautioning against ‘increasingly disturbing trend’ of dragging lawyers into criminal proceedings, Karnataka High Court quashed an FIR against a lawyer booked for forgery and offences under SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, who had appeared for the co-accused in a matrimonial case and sought RTI information on the complainant.
The single judge bench of Justice M. Nagaprasanna underscored that the independence of the Bar cannot be meddled with when the lawyers are merely discharging their professional obligations.
“Before parting with the matter, this Court considers it both necessary and appropriate to record its deep, disquiet and increasingly disturbing trend that has surfaced in recent times. This Court is encountering plethora of cases, wherein Advocates, who merely represent parties before Courts of law in the discharge of their professional obligations, are themselves being dragged into criminal proceedings and arrayed as accused. The only “fault” attributable to such Advocates, is that they appeared for their clients and articulated their cause before the concerned judicial forum. Such tendency strikes at the very heart of independence of the bar, by necessary extension the purity of administration of justice itself. Advocates are officers of the Court, they function within the confines of professional duty, acting upon the instructions of their client and presenting their cause within the four corners of law. If every Advocate, merely by a reason of appearing for a litigant is exposed to criminal prosecution and trauma of investigative proceedings, the inevitable consequence would be a chilling and paralyzing effect upon fearless discharge of professional responsibilities. The majesty of legal profession cannot be permitted to be diminished by disgruntled litigants to wield criminal law as a weapon of intimidation against the members of the bar”
The petitioner-lawyer [accused no.4) had represented accused numbers 2 & 3 in two separate proceedings initiated by the complainant against them in 2017 and 2018: a matrimonial case seeking restitution of conjugal rights and a dowry demand case coupled with caste abuse matter.
The petitioner lawyer had filed two RTI applications with a School seeking details about the complainant’s caste. The school, upon two consecutive queries, provided the lawyer with the necessary information.
In October, 2024, the complainant woman instituted fresh criminal proceedings against the petitioner and his clients by filing a complaint before for offences under Sections 336(2), 336(3) (forgery) and 340 BNS and Sections 3(1)(r) (intentionally insults or intimidates with intent to humiliate a member of a Scheduled Caste or a Scheduled Tribe in any place within public view) & (s) (abuses any member of a Scheduled Caste or a Scheduled Tribe by caste name in any place within public view) of SC ST Act. of the SC/ST Act.
The court recalled that even in 2024, while granting an interim relief in favour of the accused lawyer in the same case, the High Court had briefly examined the offences alleged to be committed by him. Then, the court had found that even upon a bare reading of the complaint, not a single ingredient of forgery or atrocity was attracted against him. The said interim order had been in force till the disposal of the case. “The role attributed to the petitioner is singularly confined to procuring certain documents from the school in which the 2nd respondent/complainant has studied and that too at the instance of accused Nos.2 and 3 whom the petitioner represented in his professional capacity, as an Advocate. Beyond this limited and purely professional act, the complaint is conspicuously silent as to any participation, connivance, fabrication or fraudulent intent on the part of the petitioner”, the court said.
