STATE TIMES NEWS
JAMMU: The agitation of Lawyers practicing in Jammu wing of J&K High Court and Subordinate Courts entered 53rd day on Monday. With major demand for opening of High Court and Subordinate Courts for physical hearing and removing restrictions on entry of lawyers and public in the courts, besides other demands, the Lawyers continued their Dharna in Janipur Court area.
The charter of demands projected by the lawyers included opening of all courts for physical entry to lawyers and public, resuming physical hearing, accepting hard copies of cases, opening of locked Bar Rooms of lawyers, providing stamp papers and tickets within court premises through stamp vendors, opening of Consumer Courts, shifting back Registry of Documents to Judicial Officers, withdrawing contempt initiated against lawyers, holding immediate election to J&K Bar Council etc.
The Lawyers Action Committee constituted by practicing lawyers to carry struggle on issues, called upon the Chief Justice to highlight the issues. Continued closure of Bar Rooms and other facilities of lawyers in Jammu for over seven months is causing great inconvenience to practicing lawyers particularly, female members of Bar. “This is no justification for restricting entry in courts now when other fields of human activity is opened. Continued closure of lawyers entry in courts is also unreasonable and arbitrary and the Lawyers Action Committee strongly protests it. Shifting of Registry to Revenue officers has proved cumbersome, both for public and lawyers. Not opening of consumer courts in J&K amounts to denial of justice to consumers which is their constitutional and legal right. Keeping of powers of J&K Bar Council with itself by the High Court is unjustified particularly when Supreme Court has also directed holding of elections for J&K Bar Council.
This amounts to denial of democracy to lawyers of J&K. Thus, lawyers Action Committee is left with no other alternative than to launch agitation demanding immediate redressal of the projected issues by Judicial and Govt. authorities,” the protesting lawyers said.
Prominent participants in Dharna included J A Kazmi (former Vice President Jammu Bar), K K Pangotra, SC Subhash, H C Jalmeria Convener of Action Committee, S K Anand, Rajinder Kumar, C S Gupta (Former Secretary Jammu Bar), B R Sharma(Former Vice President Jammu Bar), B R Chandan, Ravinder Kumar Sharma, Mohan Lal Gupta, Shah Mohd Choudhary, Subodh Singh Jamwal, JP Sharma, Sunil Dutt Sharma, K S Parihar, Rajinder Singh Jamwal, Manohar Gupta, A K Beotra, L K Moza, B S Bhargav, S C Sharma, V S Saini, Parvinder Singh, Gurpreet Singh, Jaswinder Singh, Kunal Singh Chib, Pawan Kundal, Denesh Singh Jamwal, Mohd Rashid, Naresh Kumar, Mulakh Raj, Gagandeep Singh, Gourab Sharma, Vikram Pargotra, Ravi Kumar, Rokmesh Parihar and others.