Punishment for misconduct

A cricketer who breaks the rules can be warned, fined, banned for a few matches or barred for life. A lawyer’s ladder is shorter, but the last rung is far heavier: the name comes off the roll and the person can no longer earn a living in court. Who decides which rung an advocate lands on, and what actually happens to the licence, the roll and the client’s files when the order is passed?

In two minutes

Once misconduct is proved, section 35(3) of the Advocates Act 1961 lets the disciplinary committee do only one of four things — dismiss the complaint, reprimand, suspend from practice, or remove the name from the roll — and a suspended advocate cannot practise anywhere in India.

The rest of this chapter

The full explanation, the cheat sheet, every previous-year question at every mark weight, the quiz and the answer skeletons are part of Practical Training – I: Professional Ethics and Professional Accounting System on LexBlox Semester. Sign in to unlock the subject, or read Module 1 of Legal Language and Writing free.