Supreme Court Advocates on Record (AoR) need not verify their right to practice under the Bar Council of India’s (BCI) Certificate of Practice Rules 2015.

The Supreme Court today stayed the BCI’s notification that had revoked the exemption granted to AoRs from filling the verification form under the CoP Rules, reported Bar & Bench.

A vacation bench of justices PC Ghose and Amitava Roy , while hearing an impleadment application filed by the AoR association, observed:

“Supreme Court Advocates on Record are a distinct category and all information about them is available and easily verifiable through the Computer Code allotted to them. Before becoming an AOR, the respective Bar Council itself gives continuity certificate as required under Supreme Court Rules….. After passing the AOR examination, a notification is issued by way of a judicial order and a certificate is issued by the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India certifying the advocate who has cleared the examination as an AOR The name of each and every AOR along with their code and address are available on the website of the Supreme Court of India, which is in the public domain. Therefore there is no logic or justification for withdrawal of exemption available to AORs”

The AoR association had briefed senior advocate Amarendra Sharan. It had impleaded itself in the challenge to the CoP Rules , on Thursday, through advocate Gopal Singh who argued that the AoRs shouldn’t be forced to submit their certificate of practice before the BCI as, unlike other advocates, they had become AoRs by cracking the SC’s AoR exam, reported the Times of India.

The BCI passed a resolution on 6 June 2015 to revoke the exemption granted to the AoRs from the CoP Rules verification process, and issued the revocation notification on 10 July 2015, according to B&B