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District Bar Association Dehradun v. Ishwar Shandilya & Ors.

Special Leave Petition (Civil) · 2020 INSC 237Decided 28 Feb 2020
Special Leave Petition (Civil) No. 5440 of 2020
Justice Arun Mishra · Justice M.R. Shah

Background

For over 35 years, advocates in Dehradun, Haridwar, and Udham Singh Nagar districts of Uttarakhand had been boycotting courts on all Saturdays. Data showed this cost the district courts over 90-100 working days a year. A public-interest litigant approached the Uttarakhand High Court, which directed the Bar Associations to stop the boycott, directed the Bar Council of India and State Bar Council to take disciplinary action against office-bearers calling the strikes, and asked police and district judges to ensure courts functioned normally. The District Bar Association, Dehradun challenged these directions before the Supreme Court, arguing that going on strike was a fundamental right of free speech.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court held that the High Court's directions were fully consistent with settled Supreme Court precedent (including the Constitution Bench ruling in Ex-Capt. Harish Uppal) that lawyers have no right to strike or boycott courts, even as a form of protest, except in the rarest of rare situations limited to one day. It rejected the argument that a strike is protected free speech, holding that such a right cannot come at the cost of litigants' fundamental right to speedy justice under Articles 14 and 21. The Court dismissed the Special Leave Petition, directed strict compliance with the High Court's directions, and separately took suo motu notice, issuing notices to the Bar Council of India and all State Bar Councils to propose concrete steps to end such strikes nationally.

Lesson Learnt

Lawyers have no legal right to strike or boycott courts under any guise, including free speech, doing so is treated as contempt of court because it denies ordinary litigants their constitutional right to speedy access to justice, and courts are obliged to keep functioning regardless of strike calls.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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