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Higher Education & Research Bill unconstitutional: BCI

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Press Trust of India New Delhi

In a joint meeting of the Chairman of the BCI and office bearers of all bar associations of Delhi, held here yesterday, it was unaniously resolved by the apex body for lawyers that "there shall be no compromise on the independence of the legal profession and judiciary", a BCI press release said.

"Entry of foreign law firms and institutions cannot be made easier," it said.

In the meeting, the Centre's proposed bills, the National Accreditation Regulatory Authority for Higher Educational Institutions Act 2010, the Foreign Educational Institutions (Regulation of Entry and Operations) Bills 2010 and The Prohibition of Unfair Practices in Higher Educational Institution Bill, 2010 were discussed.

 

Expressing their concern regarding the proposed bills, the members were of the view that they would paralyze the entire legal education system and were being brought to serve some vested interests.

"The Higher Education and Research Bill, 2011 is an attempt to empower the Ministry of Human Resource Development to deal with aspects of the legal education and to take away statutory functions of the state bar councils and BCI provided under the Advocates Act," BCI Chairman Manan Kumar Mishra said.

"HRD Ministry is trying to achieve indirectly what it could not achieve directly," he added.

The BCI is contemplating a "massive rally in Delhi in July in which more than one lakh lawyers from various parts of the country would participate" to protest against the proposed bills, the release said.

  

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First Published: May 08 2012 | 5:45 PM IST

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