Case: Deepak Aggarwal Vs. Keshav Kaushik

The Division Bench of the High Court by the above judgment disposed of 12 writ petitions wherein challenge was laid to the selection and appointment of certain candidates to the post of Additional District and Sessions Judge in the Haryana Superior Judicial Service (HSJS) on diverse grounds. The High Court by its judgment disposed of the writ petitions in the following manner"Selections/appointments of respondents no. 9 - (Dinesh Kumar Mittal), 12 (Rajesh Malhotra), 13 (Deepak Aggarwal), 15 (Chandra Shekhar) and 18 (Desh Raj Chalia) in CWP No. 9157 of 2008 (wherever they may be in other writ petitions) as Additional District and Sessions Judges, are hereby quashed. This direction shall, however, remain in abeyance for a period of two months to enable the High Court to make alternative arrangements;B. As a consequence of the quashment of the selections/appointments of above named respondents, the resultant five vacancies shall be filled up from the candidates next in the order of merit, out of the panel prepared by the Selection Committee;C. The appointment of Fast Track Court Judges by a process of absorption after further examination and selection contained in the recommendation of the Selection Committee dated 18.03.2008 is affirmed.D. Order dated 22.09.2008 (Annexure P-8 in CWP No. 17708 of 2008 rejecting the request of the High Court for de- reservation of six vacancies (four Scheduled Caste, 2 Backward Classes) is hereby quashed. Resultantly, the matter is remitted back to the Government to re-consider the request of the High Court for de-reservation in relaxation of rules by the competent authority empowered under the Government instructions dated 7.9.2008 and Rule 31 of the Haryana Superior Judicial Service Rules, 2007. The process of re-consideration shall be completed within six weeks and the decision be communicated to the High Court.E. If on such re-consideration, the State decides to de- reserve the vacancies, candidates recommended by the High Court vide its recommendation letter dated 25.4.2008, shall be appointed.The appellants in this group of seven appeals are, Deepak Aggarwal, Dinesh Kumar Mittal, Rajesh Malhotra, Chandra Shekhar and Desh Raj Chalia, whose selections/appointments as Additional District and Sessions Judges have been quashed by the High Court, and the Punjab and Haryana High Court, Chandigarh on its administrative side.4. On 18.05.2007, the Punjab and Haryana High Court, Chandigarh through its Registrar General issued a notification inviting applications for recruitment to certain posts of Additional District and Sessions Judge. The written examinations were conducted pursuant to the said notification wherein 64 candidates were recommended for the interview. After conducting the interview, the High Court recommended the names of 16 candidates in order of merit to the post of Additional District and Sessions Judge in the State of Haryana by direct recruitment. of the 16 candidates recommended by the High Court, 5 were the appellants. At the time of appointment, Deepak Aggarwal was working as Assistant District Attorney in Himachal Pradesh; Chandra Shekhar and Desh Raj Chalia were working as Assistant District Attorney in the State of Haryana, Rajesh Malhotra was working as Public Prosecutor in the office of Central Bureau of Investigation and Dinesh Kumar Mittal was working as Deputy Advocate General in the office of the Advocate General, Punjab.5. Based on the recommendation of the High Court, the State of Haryana issued appointment orders. Some of the unsuccessful candidates filed writ petitions before the High Court raising diverse grounds of challenge. However, as indicated above, the appointments of five appellants who were working as Assistant District Attorney/Public Prosecutor/Deputy Advocate General have been quashed holding that they did not have the requisite criteria to qualify for the recruitment as contemplated in Article 233 of the Constitution and that some of the candidates did not have requisite experience.

Court's reasoning:
46. From the above, we have no doubt that the expression, the service in Article 233(2) means the "judicial service". Other members of the service of Union or State are as it is excluded because Article 233 contemplates only two sources from which the District Judges can be appointed. These sources are: (i) judicial service; and (ii) the advocate/pleader or in other words from the Bar. District Judges can, thus, be appointed from no source other than judicial service or from amongst advocates. Article 233(2) excludes appointment of District Judges from the judicial service and restricts eligibility of appointment as District Judges from amongst the advocates or pleaders having practice of not less than seven years and who have been recommended by the High Court as such.We do not think there is any doubt about the meaning of the expression "advocate or pleader" in Article 233(2) of the Constitution. This should bear the meaning it had in law preceding the Constitution and as the expression was generally understood. The expression "advocate or pleader" refers to legal practitioner and, thus, it means a person who has a right to act and/or plead in court on behalf of his client. There is no indication in the context to the contrary. It refers to the members of the Bar practising law. In other words, the expression "advocate or pleader" in Article 233(2) has been used for a member of the Bar who conducts cases in court or, in other words acts and/or pleads in court on behalf of his client. In Sushma Suri6, a three-Judge Bench of this Court construed the expression "members of the Bar" to mean class of persons who were actually practising in courts of law as pleaders or advocates. A Public Prosecutor or a Government Counsel on the rolls of the State Bar Council and entitled to practice under the 1961 Act was held to be covered by the expression advocate under Article 233(2).Admittedly, by the above resolution of the Bar Council of India, the second and third para of Rule 49 have been deleted but we have to see the effect of such deletion. What Rule 49 of the BCI Rules provides is that an advocate shall not be a full time salaried employee of any person, government, firm, corporation or concern so long as he continues to practice. The employment spoken of in Rule 49 does not cover the employment of an advocate who has been solely or, in any case, predominantly employed to act and/or plead on behalf of his client in courts of law. If a person has been engaged to act and/or plead in court of law as an advocate although by way of employment on terms of salary and other service conditions, such employment is not what is covered by Rule 49 as he continues to practice law but, on the other hand, if he is employed not mainly to act and/or plead in a court of law, but to do other kinds of legal work, the prohibition in Rule 49 immediately comes into play and then he becomes a mere employee and ceases to be an advocate. The bar contained in Rule 49 applies to an employment for work other than conduct of cases in courts as an advocate. In this view of the matter, the deletion of second and third para by the Resolution dated 22.6.2001 has not materially altered the position insofar as advocates who have been employed by the State Government or the Central Government to conduct civil and criminal cases on their behalf in the courts are concerned.85. What we have said above gets fortified by Rule 43 of the BCI Rules. Rule 43 provides that an advocate, who has taken a full-time service or part-time service inconsistent with his practising as an advocate, shall send a declaration to that effect to the respective State Bar Council within time specified therein and any default in that regard may entail suspension of the right to practice. In other words, if full-time service or part-time service taken by an advocate is consistent with his practising as an advocate, no such declaration is necessary. The factum of employment is not material but the key aspect is whether such employment is consistent with his practising as an advocate or, in other words, whether pursuant to such employment, he continues to act and/or plead in the courts. If the answer is yes, then despite employment he continues to be an advocate. On the other hand, if the answer is in negative, he ceases to be an advocate.86. An advocate has a two-fold duty: (1) to protect the interest of his client and pursue the case briefed to him with the best of his ability, and (2) as an officer of the Court. Whether full-time employment creates any conflict of duty or interest for a Public Prosecutor/Assistant Public Prosecutor? We do not think so. As noticed above, and that has been consistently stated by this Court, a Public Prosecutor is not a mouth- piece of the investigating agency. In our opinion, even though Public Prosecutor/Assistant Public Prosecutor is in full-time employ with the government and is subject to disciplinary control of the employer, but once he appears in the court for conduct of a case or prosecution, he is guided by the norms consistent with the interest of justice. His acts always remain to serve and protect the public interest. He has to discharge his functions fairly, objectively and within the framework of the legal provisions. It may, therefore, not be correct to say that an Assistant Public Prosecutor is not an officer of the court. The view in Samarendra Das22 to the extent it holds that an Assistant Public Prosecutor is not an officer of the Court is not a correct view.87. The Division Bench has in respect of all the five private appellants - Assistant District Attorney, Public Prosecutor and Deputy Advocate General - recorded undisputed factual position that they were appearing on behalf of their respective States primarily in criminal/civil cases and their appointments were basically under the C.P.C. or Cr.P.C. That means their job has been to conduct cases on behalf of the State Government/C.B.I. in courts. Each one of them continued to be enrolled with the respective State Bar Council. In view of this factual position and the legal position that we have discussed above, can it be said that these appellants were ineligible for appointment to the office of Additional District and Sessions Judge? Our answer is in the negative. The Division Bench committed two fundamental errors, first, the Division Bench erred in holding that since these appellants were in full-time employment of the State Government/Central Government, they ceased to be advocate under the 1961 Act and the BCI Rules, and second, that being a member of service, the first essential requirement under Article 233(2) of the Constitution that such person should not be in any service under the Union or the State was attracted. In our view, none of the five private appellants, on their appointment as Assistant District Attorney/Public Prosecutor/Deputy Advocate General, ceased to be advocate and since each one of them continued to be advocate, they cannot be considered to be in the service of the Union or the State within the meaning of Article 233(2). The view of the Division Bench is clearly erroneous and cannot be sustained.88. As regards construction of the expression, "if he has been for not less than seven years an advocate" in Article 233(2) of the Constitution, we think Mr. Prashant Bhushan was right in his submission that this expression means seven years as an advocate immediately preceding the application and not seven years any time in the past. This is clear by use of has been. The present perfect continuous tense is used for a position which began at some time in the past and is still continuing. Therefore, one of the essential requirements articulated by the above expression in Article 233(2) is that such person must with requisite period be continuing as an advocate on the date of application.89. Rule 11 of the HSJS Rules provides for qualifications for direct recruits in Haryana Superior Judicial Service. Clause (b) of this rule provides that the applicant must have been duly enrolled as an advocate and has practised for a period not less than seven years. Since we have already held that these five private appellants did not cease to be advocate while working as Assistant District Attorney/Public Prosecutor/Deputy Advocate General, the period during which they have been working as such has to be considered as the period practising law. Seen thus, all of them have been advocates for not less than seven years and were enrolled as advocates and were continuing as advocates on the date of the application.