Lawyers - Duties & Responsibilities.

We all know that in the courts, judgments are primarily reflection of evidence (right or wrong) and arguing capability of advocates. They need not necessarily be truthful and just. Most judgments do not reflect either truth or justice, now a days.

Justice is justice if only it is truthful apart from being compliant of laws of the land.

The sacred duty of Advocate is to argue for clients and assist court in arriving at truthful judgments. If their client is right then they should struggle to get favorable judgement and if client is wrong he should struggle to get least punishment. Never a lie should be established as truth. Never a genuinely innocent person should awarded punishment. Otherwise Judiciary loses its sacredness and relevance.

• In between the complainant and accused one is right and other wrong.
• Advocate of the wrong doer is the first person to grasp the full truth of the situation.
• He should convince his client to plead guilty and get away with least punishment, having committed the offence.
• Advocates should never encourage clients to tell lies in the court. It is the duty of advocates assist the court in delivering truthful judgments. Otherwise they would be driving the nation towards anarchy.
• People do wrong things and make huge amounts of money. The bigger the wrongdoing the greater is the quantum of money. Naturally they have capability to spend huge amounts of money defending their cases in courts and pay hefty fees to lawyers. Many famous Supreme Court advocates, today, are paid fees at Rs. one lakh per hour apart from travel by chartered aircraft, 5* hotel stay and commute by BMW cars. No honest person can avail his services at this price tag. Almost all his clients are thugs and hooligans.
• I remember Bharat Shah, Mumbai based diamond merchant and hindi film producer accused of mafia & extortion activities was in jail without bail for over 18 months during 2001-2002. His bail petition was set aside by courts 14 times. Finally he was convicted in 2003. Imagine how much fees he must have paid to his advocates (almost all best advocates of the country represented his case). The talk of the town then was each bail petition he paid Rs. one crore as fees, mostly in cash. What was the necessity for these famous, rich and learned advocates to fly from Delhi to Mumbai in chartered plane and defend a known thug in Magistrate courts? It is just money and nothing else.
• It is worthwhile to recollect the story of Justice Jagmohanlal Sinha, Allahabad High Court judge who disqualified Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in an election petition case and subsequent events led to Emergency declaration by Indira Gandhi in 1975.

"Resolve to be honest at all events; and if in your own judgment 

you cannot be an honest lawyer, resolve to be honest without being a lawyer. 

Choose some other occupation ... Abraham Lincoln"

"Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors to compromise 

whenever you can. As a peacemaker the lawyer has superior opportunity 

of being a good man.  ... Abraham Lincoln"