Fissures seem to have appeared in Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) on Thursday after its secretary called an emergent general meeting of the lawyers' body on May 11, to deliberate on agenda, removing senior advocate Dushyant Dave from the post of President.
Dave on other hand has written to the bar members calling the move by secretary Ashok Arora as illegal and improper saying he is an elected President of the lawyers' body and would continue to serve till his tenure ends.
The SCBA notice issued by Arora, which was confirmed by him to the PTI said, Members of SCBA are hereby informed that an emergent general meeting' has been convened under Rule 22 of SCBA rules by the undersigned for May 11 at 4.30 pm. The meeting shall be conducted over webinar.
It said that the agenda of meeting will be to consider the resolutions signed by 410 members of SCBA, addressed to the secretary to condemn the unauthorised resolution dated February 25, purportedly passed by the executive committee and to immediately withdraw the same.
The other agendas to be deliberated in the meeting would include not to use the office of SCBA for political agendas, to remove Dushyant Dave from the post of SCBA President and to remove him from the primary membership of the SCBA for working against the interest of Bar.
Hours after the issuance of notice, Dave wrote to the SCBA members saying that he writes to them for bringing to the attention, the efforts by Secretary Ashok Arora, which will tell them about his design.
Confirming that he wrote to the bar members, Dave told PTI that the entire exercise of calling the emergent meeting is illegal and improper as the executive committee has not decided to call any such meeting.
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So, whole exercise is unfortunate and wrong. It will have no purpose nor can it achieve any objective except to tarnish reputation of this great body, SCBA. I am the President elected lawfully and will continue to serve you till my term is over. This attempt violates every cannon procedure and law and has no legs to stand, Dave wrote in his message to SCBA members.
He further said, I have been elected by you and it is because of that I am serving you to the best of my abilities. Only you have the power and right to act, not some person carrying personal agenda. Dignity and respect of this great institution, SCBA is at stake. So please be informed that I will continue to serve you through my tenure and will not be stopped by a motivated individual.
On February 25, differences seem to have appeared among the top office bearers in the SCBA over the stand taken by the lawyers' body on a 'resolution' concerning statements made by Justice Arun Mishra about Prime Minister Narendra Modi at International Judicial Conference-2020.
Shortly after Dave had issued February 25 'resolution', allegedly signed by several members of the lawyers' body expressing anguish and concern over Justice Mishra's statements, Arora had claimed that "no resolution has been passed" as he has not signed the statement released to the media.
Arora had then said, "There was no executive council or general body meeting of the Association. The President has taken an arbitrary dictatorial and irresponsible stand. He cannot speak on behalf of SCBA without calling general body meeting or meeting of the executive council on such a serious issue".
Arora had then said that all the communication to the media is to be sent through the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), who is general secretary of the SCBA. "It is not a resolution in the eyes of law because it was not signed by me," he said, adding that Dave has made available to media a circular which contained suggestions of only six to seven members.
The lawyers' body in its resolution had said, "The SCBA expresses its strong reservations of the statement and condemns the same strongly. The SCBA believes that the independence of the judiciary is the basic structure under the Constitution of India and that such independence be preserved in letter and spirit."