Reporting the names of lawyers appearing in a case will be an "illegal" exercise considering the fact that the Supreme Court on Friday dismissed an appeal against a Madras High Court decision that ordered the media not to publish any names of advocates or judges in any case.
With the Supreme Court upholding this order — laid down by one High Court has become the law of the land. The petitioner, one S Bhaskar Mathuram, had first approached the Madras High Court highlighting a news story of 12 Dalit children aged between 7 and 12 years being slapped with cases under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POSCO) by the local police. He sought compensation for the children who are innocent and quashing of FIR.
Mathuram not only lost the case but faced prosecution from the Bar Council of Tamil Nadu as the HC directed action against him for violating Code of Professional Ethics by filing petitions for publicity. Besides, the Court added, "Often times, we have been noticing that the print and electronic media is carrying on publication of the names of legal practitioners as well as the names of the Judges of the High Court concerned, who dealt with particular cases. Publication of names of practitioners who may have appeared for one party or the other in a particular case can lead to an indirect method of soliciting or indulging in advertisement of the professional abilities or skills of the advocates."
Dealing with his appeal, a bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi and PC Pant found nothing in the appeal to interfere with. Mathuram's counsel argued that following the decision, HC had directed HC Registrar to issue a circular restricting publication of names of lawyers, but the bench went on to dismiss the case.