BCD to reconsider notification making ID with NCR address compulsory for enrolment

New Delhi, May 8 The Bar Council of Delhi (BCD) on Monday told the Delhi High Court that it is reconsidering its recent notification making Aadhar and Voter Identity Card bearing a Delhi-NCR address mandatory for enrolment with it.

A lawyer, appearing for the bar body, told a bench of Justice Prathiba M. Singh that the matter will be reconsidered by it in a meeting to be held on May 12.

The court then adjourned the matter for further hearing to May 23 and also asked the BCD to file a short affidavit on the matter.

Justice Singh said: "Since the matter is stated to be under reconsideration of the Bar Council of Delhi, list on May 23."

An advocate and Delhi University alumna has filed a plea before the high court challenging the BCD's notification.

Calling BCD's decision arbitrary and discriminatory, the petition filed by advocate Rajani Kumari, who is a resident of Bihar, challenges BCD's notice issued on April 13 stating that lawyers proposing to get enrolled with the BCD will have to produce their Aadhaar and Voter ID cards showing Delhi or the NCR as their place of residence.

Earlier Justice Singh asked the petitioner to make the Bar Council of India (BCI) a party to the plea.

The BCD has stated in its notice that it is mandatory for the fresh law graduates seeking to enrol in the national capital to attach their Aadhaar and Voter ID card copies bearing an address in Delhi/NCR and lack of which will lead to no enrolment.

According to Kumari, the council's decision would act like a barrier for law graduates coming from different parts of the country and looking to practise law in the capital for better prospects.

"The requirement of Aadhaar Card and Voter ID Card with the address of Delhi or NCR discriminates against those law graduates who do not have an address in Delhi or NCR. This creates an arbitrary classification between law graduates based on their residential address, which is a violation of Article 14," the plea contended.

It stated that the blanket restriction on enrolment with BCD lacks intelligible differentia as to how a law graduate belonging to Agra having and graduated from National Law School, Bangalore is unequally placed with one domiciled in Meerut.

"The impugned notification is completely silent about the objective it seeks to achieve from the classification stipulated therein," the plea stated.

A Public Interest Litigation was also filed by lawyer Shannu Baghel before the high court last week to set aside the BCD's notification. Baghel is a practising advocate in Delhi High Court and District Courts.

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