HS Bawa/Yes Punjab
Ludhiana, August 12, 2022:
The Bar Council of Punjab and Haryana High Court has busted a scam operating in Ludhiana courts where 140 ‘Munnai Bhai Advocates’ posing as real advocates have been found representing their clients in the district courts for years altogether.
Interestingly, most of these either don’t have a degree or have degrees that are fake or fabricated. They have been using licenses issued in the name of other advocates practicing elsewhere or not practicing at all.
After identifying these 140 ‘Munnabhai’ advocates, the 3-member disciplinary committee of the ‘Bar Council’ has sent the relevant investigation report and the names of the lawyers to the Ludhiana Police Commissioner for action against them. It is almost certain that cases will be registered against them. Apart from this, the Bar Council has restrained these lawyers from appearing in courts with immediate effect.
Another stunning fact that came to the notice of the probe team was that a lawyer who has been practicing on the license number of another lawyer even contested the election for the post of Executive Member of the Ludhiana Bar Association. He got printed pamphlets for his promotion and even won the election.
The Disciplinary Committee of the ‘Bar Council Punjab and Haryana, consisting of Chairman Mr. CM Munjal, Member Mr. Harish Rai Dhanda, and Co-opted Member Mr. Vikas Bishnoi, has prepared a detailed report on the matter which is summarized as follows.
Mr. David Gill, an advocate from Ludhiana, complained that an advocate named Parminder Singh who has a fake degree is not only practicing on a license issued by the Bar Council in the name of someone else, but he is an executive of the Bar Association. The license number P-921/2016 that Parminder Singh was practicing on is in the name of Mr. Prince Roop Roy, a lawyer from Patiala.
After this, Parminder Singh, who appeared before the disciplinary committee, said that he had taken the degree for one and a half lakh rupees through a lawyer named Deepak Prajapati. Stating that Mr. David Gill had in fact introduced him to Mr. Parjapati, Parminder Singh said Mr. Parjapati and these two had also given him the license of the Bar Council to practice law for two and a half lakh rupees. Parminder Singh said that later he found out that he had been deceived. Parminder Singh alleged that Prajapati has given degrees and licenses to about 400 people in the same way.
In light of the said matter, the Disciplinary Committee collated the record of the Bar Association Ludhiana and the license numbers of the Bar Council from 2010 to 2020. It was revealed that during this period, 140 lawyers in Ludhiana were practicing on the license number of other lawyers in whose names were licenses actually issued.
Referring to the seriousness of this matter, the Disciplinary Committee has sent this investigation report to the District and Sessions Judge and also to the Police Commissioner of Ludhiana Mr. Kaustubh Sharma for action.
It is also worth mentioning here that this phenomenon cannot be limited only to Ludhiana and more big and surprising aspects of this matter are yet to come to light.
Below we are publishing the inquiry report of the Disciplinary Committee, followed by the names of the real advocates and their numbers, and then the list of fake i.e. ‘Munnabhai’ advocates.
CLICK HERE to like YesPunjab.com Facebook Page for regular updates
