NAGALAND BAR ASSOCIATION Vs. STATE OF NAGALAND

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Have heard Mr. A. Zhimomi, learned counsel for the petitioner, and Mrs. Y. Longkumer, learned Govt. Advocate, appearing for the respondents.

(2.) Lamented George Bernard Shaw in his preface, entitled "Preface on Bosses", written for his play The Millioneress'. The law is equal before all of us, but we are not all equal before the law". Lest this epitaph on the justice delivery system does not turn into an absolute reality or becomes a permanent feature of the judicial administration, imperative it is that justice delivery system be one, which ensures to its people reasonable, fair and just procedure. Can a justice delivery system be regarded fair, just and reasonable, if the Advocates, as a class, are excluded, as a whole, from the justice delivery system itself ? The answer to this question has to be an unhesitant and emphatic "no", for when Advocates are regarded as Officers of the Court the Advocates, as a class, become an Integral and Inseverable part of the Judicial system, which we have adopted under our Constitution. The exclusion of the Advocates, as a class, from the real of judicial justice' can be on the strength of specific legislation or by creating, without support of law, such situations, which may, in effect, remove the Bar, as a whole, from the entire justice delivery system.

(3.) In the above backdrop of facts governing the administration of justice, let me unfold the facts and material stages, which have given rise to the present writ petition.