RAJENDAR LAL Vs. RAM KRISHNA GUPTA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Shri Ram Krishna Gupta worked as an Advocate's clerk in Simla from 1.937 to 1941, in which year he was permitted by the former Koti State to practice as a Mukhtar. That State and the Bhajji State enrolled him as a Pleader in 1944, and alter the formation of the present State of Himachal Pradesh, arid under the then Legal Practitioners Rules, he was admitted and enrolled by this Court as a Pleader 1st Grade on 3-1-1949. During the material time he was practising at Kasumpti, headquarters of the revenue District of Mahasu, and he is doing so even now. He possesses no law degree and has passed no law examination.

(2.) A client of his, Shri Rajendra Lal, brought five charges of professional misconduct against him, which were entrusted for enquiry to the Registrar of this Court. The Registrar, on foot of oral and documentary evidence produced by the parties, came to the conclusion on 31-8-1951 that none of the charges had been established. Thereafter I heard learned counsel for the parties on the Registrar's report. The learned counsel for the complainant pressed three of the five charges before me. These are charges dealt with as second, third and fourth charges in the Registrar's report. I shall take up the last one first.

(3.) The fourth charge against the Pleader relates to a criminal complaint under Section 447, I. P. C. for the filing of which the complainant alleges to have engaged him in or about. June 1948. According to the complainant a fee of Rs. 60/~ was fixed for this case and paid to him in cash at the time of engagement. The complaint was written out by the Pleader and signed, by the complainant, who also executed the vakalatnama in his favour, and the Pleader promised to file the complaint himself. The Pleader thereafter kept on telling the complainant that the complaint had been sent to the police for enquiry, and eventually the latter was informed by the former in March 1.949 that the Magistrate had ordered the complaint to be consigned to the record room. On 23-4-1949 the complainant applied for a copy of the Court's Order, and on 4-7- 1949 he was informed that no record of any such case was in existence. Exhibit P. A. is this petition for copy along with the office report in question. It is signed by the complainant and a part of it is admittedly in the handwriting of the Pleader.