Jammu Tawi, Oct 17: The Action Committee of Advocates Bar Jammu constituted by the practicing advocates in High Court and Subordinate Courts held a day long dharna in the District Courts, Jammu to lodge protest against closure of entry for lawyers and general public to High Court and Subordinate Courts in Jammu . The demands placed are as follows:
- Opening of all courts for physical entry to lawyers and public, resume physical hearing,
- Accepting hard copies of cases,
- Opening the locked Bar Rooms of lawyers,
- Providing stamp papers and tickets within court premises through stamp vendors,
- Immediate opening of Consumer Courts,
- Shifting back Registry of Documents to Judicial Officers,
- Withdrawing contempt initiated against the lawyers,
- Holding immediate election to the J&K Bar Council,
Those who addressed the dharna termed the closure as unreasonable, unconstitutional and dictatorial particularly when all other institutions, shopping malls, cinema halls, public parks, govt. offices etc have been made functional. In courts also, barring advocates, other persons of security and court staff members have entry in the courts. Functioning of Courts without lawyers cannot be conceived. The Constitutional and legal rights of people are almost paralysed. The virtual mode is an eye wash particularly in 2G network. Height is that all facilities of lawyers like Bar Rooms, Canteen, Fruit shop, parking in lawyers' chambers are closed. The lawyers have been subjected to unprecedented hardships. Selling of stamp papers and tickets by stamp vendors are closed in court area. The whole court area has become deserted. The shifting of registry of documents to Revenue Officers has caused great hardship to public due to delays and corruption.
The prominent participants in today's dharna included JA Kazmi, HC Jalmeria, Vinod Abrol, Chander Shekhar Gupta, Subodh Jamwal, Manohar Gupta, Kulbhushan Sajgotra, Meharban Singh, Atta Mohd, RKS Thakur, Amit Gupta, Umesh Sharma, Kunal Chib, Arjun Manhas, Bhavisya Sudan, Arvind Jalmeria, Jagjit Singh, Rajinder Kumar, Karan Kapoor, Atul Raina, Kamal Magotra, Divya Ishan, Lal Chand Sharma, Meet Kumar Anand, Jasbir Singh, Parvinder Singh, Gagandeep Singh, Rakesh Kumar, Deepak Mahajan, Ravinder Kumar, Narinder Sharma, Rakesh Singh Slathia, Jasbir Jasrotia, Kamal Kishor.
