In last month’s column, Court Witness described the labour pains of giving birth to a special leave petition (SLP). But after filing successfully with the goblin-like clerk Bakshi-ji the real work of raising an SLP was apparently only just beginning - now it needs to start taking its first steps...
I cradled the green cardboard-bound volumes in my arms as I went back to the office that day.
In two weeks the matter would be listed on a miscellaneous day before one of the 12 benches of the Supreme Court and the court would decide whether it merited its time and scrutiny.
I imagined that somewhere in a vast office in one of the plush Lutyens’ Delhi bungalows, a day before the hearing, a judge of the Supreme Court would be sitting, poring intently over my carefully drafted SLP, and nodding gravely at my intricately reasoned grounds of appeal.
Perhaps in the course of the hearing a kind word or three would fall from the bench, remarking on the clarity and the conciseness of drafting that is rarely seen in SLPs these days. I would be in court beaming, somewhat bashfully, at this generous and unexpected compliment on my legal skills at the start of a long and glorious legal career.
I opened my SLP to admire my handiwork and reassure myself of my career prospects.
After I’d found the fifth typo within the first three pages, I decided it would not be a good thing for my ego to scrutinise my own efforts with such exactitude. The blissful daydreams of judicial acknowledgement of my brilliance were now replaced with nightmarish scenarios where the judge mercilessly points out all the childish typographical errors in the main petition as I sink lower and lower in my seat, hoping not to be noticed by anyone as the culprit.
Perhaps the judge should not go through my SLP in too much detail, I thought. Still, the volume felt substantial in my hands. That was something.
Advance warning
A short while later, the advance causelists were out: the matter would be listed on a Friday.
And although advance causelists do not specify a bench, I used a trick that court clerk extraordinaire Bakshiji had put up my sleeve to find out which judge would hear my SLP. I would also sound very keyed in to the client.
(The “trick”, by the way, is very simple. Although the advanced causelist does not name any judges, it does mention the numerical code of the judge before whom it will be listed. On the left-hand side of the list, under the SLP No. and the Section No., you are likely to see two numbers separated by a comma like this “84,101”. This refers to the number of the judge in the order in which they are sworn in. For instance, Justice Kapadia’s code is 84 and so on.)
It worked and the client seemed impressed that I could predict the judge, even though the causelist did not say (although technically it did say, of course).
But this was no parlour trick to blind an easily impressed audience. The composition of the bench was the all-important factor that would decide whom to brief.
The formula in the Supreme Court, if you can afford it, seems to be: one eminent senior counsel + one junior senior counsel from same state as presiding judge = guaranteed notice + high chance of interim stay.
Not that both senior counsel would necessarily have to argue but often the madness of miscellaneous days means that it is always good to have a backup.
The combo of senior counsel decided, it was time to take the SLP for its first walk, about the posh parts of town.
Continued in: SLP Quadrilogy (Part 3): First day of school, SLP gets educated by Eminent Senior Counsel, disciplined by Junior
Court Witness is an advocate of the Supreme Court of India and tweets @courtwitness1.
Court Witness’ previous postcards:
- Giving birth to an SLP (part 1)
- The circus has left town: Any given Katju day, Court Witnessed
- Judging new judges, the bar’s insane expectations and those larger than life
- I hate you (like I love you) or the torrid love between journalists and the 30-headed Supreme Court hydra
- How advocates are countries, and the lost souls of litigation
- From Gopal to Rohinton - A tale of two SGs
- SH Kapadia mid-term appraisal: Crying Room Hercules cleans SC stables after dirty decades, only half-done
- Justice ‘Goldilocks’ Reddy should be sorely missed, not misrepresented
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Part 3 later this week, followed by the conclusion to the SLP quadrilogy...
Also, why are you behaving like Facebook? Why have you changed your format?
If it aint broke, dont fix it.
Read alot more of B&B now - if i want news summaries i;ll use google news, not LI.
There have been a few projects that have been taking up my time, which will hopefully launch shortly and be very exciting.
We have also been a bit short-staffed on the editorial side recently.
Luckily, we are recruiting and will in any case get back to our normal scheduled programming as soon as possible:
jobsmedia.in/2011/11/18/journalists-legally-india-mumbai-delhi-bangalore/
You will know when we're ready.
Appreciate you taking the time out to let us know.
Best wishes
Kian
But this part disturbs me: one eminent senior counsel + one junior senior counsel from same state as presiding judge = guaranteed notice + high chance of interim stay.
I have seen it happen myself, and it is deebly disturbing trend that whether or not your SLP would be dismissed in 5 seconds, or notice would be issued, often depends on WHO is appearing on your behalf. Judges should be impartial and give due consideration to each petition on its merits, and not on the face that is put forward between them. This is a tragic reality unfortunately, and even more regrettably, most lawyers have resigned themselves as this being part of life, and there is little to no effort to change this madness.
How I handicapped the Court witness' SLP toddler.
It was two days before the misc. day, vinodji dumped 50+ SLPs on my desk colourfuly flagged and bookmarked, I was supposed to go over them, make a succinct one page note and brief honb'le lordship in the evenings on the merits.
That gave about 30 min per SLP, in them read the cringe worthy application for condonation of delay (yeah yeah my client is illiterate hack never heard of anything called limitation while he was doing time in a godforsaken prison etc.), 3 prior judgments (TC, SB, DB), the main petition, the relevant law (NDPS and IT meant absolute liability and extra work) and the prayer (ask for the moon and get a moonstone). Ingest it all and then type out the 300 words report.
My mood was sombre in the morning, the autowallah charged me 20 bucks extra, and the SLP mountain did not enhance the mood. in the past 6 months I have read through hills (if not mountains) of SLPs history of men who have been chewed up by the system and thrown away, surely i who has forsaken glitzy world of corporate deskjob (inspite of nls pedigree) for a noble (lowpaying in comparison) research position to the supreme arbitrators of law of land, would give the defeated a hope. but in six months i despised lutyens, i despised the SLPs which in 90% of cases seemed to be a time wasting tactics. with my idealism taking the high street, i was already in market looking for the comfort of a steady fat paycheck and an air conditioned office to beat delhis heat (its quite hot even at lutyens).
So the first SLP of the pack seemed to have been written by a rookie, didnt know how to frame a proper petition, didnt the hack have a senior, at least have a look at other SLPs, if nothing plagiarise from the legal aid office. nah the hack seems to have tried to write everything himself (probably in sleep with so many typos), probably trying to justify the billing to his client, so an idealist newcomer like me (sigh!). what to do? the facts were dubious at best all the three judgment went against the client, that probably set the fate of the SLP. in my brief half year experience, the law lords first ask about the verdicts of the courts at the lower pedestal, if all the underlings down the chain decided one way, there is the fainest chance of SLP to be accepted (anyway the SLP admission rate in SC is lower than for a Harvard LLB program).
so no point wasting my time on this new hacks SLP, my condolences and the report was typed in few clipped words. Later in the evening the files were in three columns, one where all the courts rejected, one where there were mixed judgments and the final where the law researcher felt needed special attention, the last column rarely had more than 2-3 files.
the first bunch were done in less than 3 min, while the rest of the two columns took 2 hours.
the nextday i raced to the court, a rare free day (at least for the first half), its great to see lawyers trying to argue non exsistent case and the jusdicial retorts (and to gloat over my handiworks, a very small clog in the vast machine). SLP lawyers have less than 30 sec to convince the judges, they form a line like a soup kitchen, each going to the pulpit and getting thumped down.
in all only one SLP out of 50 got accepted. unfortunately Court witness' SLP was not among them. so ended the brief existence of the SLP.
Disclaimer: all usual disclaimers that they give before a film that shows somwthing ultrareal but we know is fake.
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