A frustrated walk-out by Kerala high court judge K Vinod Chandran halted court proceedings less than half hour after they had begun on Friday, reported the Hindu.

Chandran had granted 11 pass overs on request from government pleaders when the 12th government pleader also asked for a pass over on the ground that he had not received the case files from the advocate general’s (AG) office. After this request Chandran walked out, according to the report.

He later summoned Advocate General KP Dandapani and Kerala High Court Advocates’ Association president Babu Paul to his chamber and expressed his displeasure at having to defer cases repeatedly, owing to what appeared to be the disinterest of lawyers from the AG’s office. He said lawyers should cooperate to ensure that the courts worked smoothly.

The 12th case of that day had been deferred repeatedly for the last three years. The case is against a cooperative bank whose secretary was impleaded in 2010 and had been asked to file a reply within three months, but none had been filed till date.