- Out of a total of 3,433 AORs, only 129 are Muslims
- 38 Muslims declared senior lawyers since March 1966
- Muslim barristers too are in unimpressive numbers
- Only four Muslims at the office of SC’s secretary general
Team Clarion
NEW DELHI – There have been a few Muslims as Advocates-on-Record (AORs) and Senior Lawyers at the Supreme Court of India, according to a new book, Muslims in India 1947-2024 – Fake Narratives versus Ground Realities.
One can become an Advocate-on-Record (AOR) after passing one of the top 10 toughest examinations in the country, conducted annually. An AOR qualifies for the exams conducted by the Supreme Court who has been enrolled with the bar for at least five years and worked with an AOR of not less than five years of standing. Only an AOR has the privilege to file an appearance and act on behalf of a party before the apex court. An advocate who is not an AOR cannot appear on behalf of a party unless instructed by him/her. Members of this niche club of lawyers can file and plead before the Supreme Court as per Order IV of Supreme Court Rules framed under Article 145 of the Constitution.
An AOR is trained for one year only under an AOR for practicing before the Supreme Court of India. The AOR system in India is akin to the British legal practice of barristers and solicitors. To be eligible for the AOR exam, advocates have to obtain a minimum score of 60 per cent, which equates to at least 240 out of 400 marks. Additionally, they must attain a minimum of 50 percent in each subject, including Practice and Procedure, Drafting, Professional Ethics, and Leading Cases. In addition, an AOR must have an office in Delhi within a 16-km radius of the Supreme Court and hire a registered clerk within a month of registration. After registration, an AOR is given a unique identification number to be used with all documents submitted to the apex court.
At the end of 2024, India had a total of 3,433 AORs of whom 129 have been Muslims, as per the list furnished by the AOR Association. It was only a day after 1954’s Independence Day that a Muslim became the first AOR) – M I Khowaja. It took another two years for another Muslim to be an AOR – Dr VA Syed Mohammed. The next Muslim AOR came in October 1965 – Syed Shaukat Husain Sultan. As a policy, the AOR system was first introduced in 1966 by the Supreme Court as a separate category of advocates to practice before the Supreme Court, the final court of appeal for all civil and criminal cases, and has original jurisdiction for the protection of fundamental rights and interstate disputes.
AORs representing parties before the Supreme Court are required to be specially trained and qualified, as compared to advocates practicing before other courts. The next Muslim AOR came in September 1974. One Muslim AOR each came in 1976, 1978, and 1979. Between 1981 and 1984 came five Muslim AORs. In 1984 came into existence the Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association (SCAORA) which today has a membership of 2,064 at the end of 2024, including 97 Muslims. Two years later, three Muslims became AOR. In April 1989 another Muslim was on the list. In April 1991, only one Muslim became an AOR while it took another seven years for a Muslim to become an AOR in October 1998. In April 2000 another Muslim earned this distinction.
In the first decade of the 21st century, 11 Muslims became AOR. Five Muslims became AOR in 2011 including the first Muslim woman, Munawwar Naseem. Only one Muslim became AOR in February 2012. The AOR system, first introduced in 1966 through the Supreme Court Rules, was amended in 2013 when a two-member bench of the Supreme Court found that the AOR system was “getting converted into a profession of cheating.” That year came six Muslim AORs. The year 2014 brought four Muslims. The year 2015 had five AORs including a woman. Also in 2016, there were six AORs. Six Muslims became AORs in 2017 including two women.
There were five Muslim AORs in 2018 including two women. The AOR system was amended for the second time in 2019 when seven Muslims including a woman became AOR. History was made in 2020 when 17 Muslims became AOR including six women. The following year only one Muslim became AOR. In 2022, eleven Muslims including two women, became AOR. History was made again in 2023 when 17 Muslims, including two women, became AOR. Also, that year came the first-ever AOR Muslim couple.
Also, that year in November, a two-member bench of the Supreme Court criticised an AOR for pursuing a frivolous case and emphasised the need for a more substantial and responsible role for AORs in the legal system, while also urging collaborative efforts with the Bar to reform and enhance the AOR system. An AOR cannot merely be a “signing authority,” the bench called for a “comprehensive plan” for reforming and improving the AOR system, to be drawn up in collaboration with the Bar. Between January and September 2024, six Muslims including two women became AOR.
Abysmally Low Number of Senior Lawyers
Muslim lawyers getting ‘senior’ tags from the Supreme Court have remained abysmally low. Members of the super-elite club enjoy a suite of privileges and fewer restrictions – they have a right of pre-audience in the courtrooms: judges must hear them first. They do not file cases or handle legal paperwork; they only argue. The law bars them from entertaining litigants directly. Also, the seniority tag magnifies their social capital. According to a report, senior advocates in the world’s seventh-largest country by size are like Britain’s ‘Queen’s Counsels’, only rarer. A report by the Bar Council of India (BCI) in 2013 suggested that less than one percent of all enrolled lawyers are senior advocates. The Supreme Court ordains lawyers to be seniors.
The eligibility depends on the counsels’ “ability, standing at the Bar, or special knowledge or experience in law.” Advocates apply directly to be declared seniors, or judges can invite them. The BCI has framed specific rules and procedures to designate a lawyer as a Senior Advocate. The power to designate an advocate as a Senior Advocate lies with the Supreme Court or the high courts, similar to the laws of the United Kingdom where the Queen’s Counsel or King’s Counsel decides the designation of senior advocates and they get silk robes and gowns. The powers associated with the post do not provide special treatment, or discriminate against the non-designated advocates. However, at any point, if it does, it violates the Constitution’s Articles 14 and 18.
Between March 1966 and December 2024, a total of 646 people were designated as Senior Advocates by the Supreme Court, of whom 38 were Muslims. The first Muslim was Dr VA Sayed Muhammad in November 1966. The next one came after three years, Dr Haji NA Noor Mohammed, and Moinul Hague Chaudhury. In 2024, five Muslims were declared senior lawyers. In 2024, a panel headed by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) designated the highest number of female senior advocates in the court’s entire history since 1966, 12 in 75 years and 11 in just one year. In January 2024, it gave the status of senior advocate to 61 lawyers, of which 11 were women. This brought the number of lawyers with the coveted tag to 100 lawyers in 2024, of whom 21 were women. Interestingly, the list had lawyers between the age group of 39 and 73. In 2022, the apex court modified the 2017 ruling and ordered that one mark each shall be allocated for every year of practice between 10-20 years. In 2023, the top court “refined” the process further and declined to end the secret ballot completely.
In March 2023, Bar & Bench asserted that the legal profession continues to be an ‘old boys club’. India has 3,149 Senior Advocates across the Supreme Court and 25 high courts, of whom 106 are women. While a mere four women were designated from the inception of the apex court in 1950 till 2013, 15 women have been conferred the title in the previous nine years. Formed in May 1951, the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) in 2024 has 535 Life Members, of whom only 23 are Muslims. Its Executive Committee’s panel for 2024-25, headed by renowned lawyer and former Union Minister Kapil Sibal, has 21 members, without a single Muslim.
160 Barristers in All
India, according to data, has seen a total of 76 barristers in colonial times. According to Smart Scrapers, a web scraping service company, there are 160 Barristers in India as of December 2024, a 3.23 percent increase from 2023. Of these, 141 barristers are single-owner operations while the remaining 19 are part of larger brands. The top three states with the most barristers are Uttar Pradesh with 26, Tamil Nadu (20) and Maharashtra (18). All barristers have a strong digital presence across various platforms with two running YouTube channels. About 53 barristers have their websites.
A barrister is one of the two types of practicing lawyers in England and Wales, the other being the solicitor. In common law jurisdictions like New Zealand, Canada, and Australia, lawyers are entitled to practice both as barristers and solicitors, but it remains a separate system of qualification to practice exclusively as a barrister. Lincoln’s Inn, an inclusive and diverse professional community in existence for more than 600 years, is one of the four Inns of Court that have the exclusive right to call students to the Bar of England and Wales. It, along with three other Inns of Court – Middle Temple, Inner Temple, and Gray’s Inn, is recognised as one of the world’s most prestigious professional bodies of judges and lawyers.
Barristers are experts in courtroom advocacy, expert legal counsel, client representation in court, and written guidance. Lawyers, advocates, and solicitors navigate various legal landscapes while barristers often focus on specialised areas within the court systems of the UK and a handful of other countries. Hyderabad’s Fatima Akbaruddin Owaisi became India’s youngest Muslim woman barrister in 2023. Interestingly, her paternal uncle, Asaduddin Owaisi, Hyderabad’s five-term Lok Sabha MP and President of the AIMIM, is a barrister from Lincoln’s Inn.
The barristers’ list includes several Muslims – Mohammadali Carim Chagla, Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court from 1947 to 1958, Sayyad Agha Haider, known for refusing to pass the death sentence to Bhagat Singh, Mohammad Hidayatullah, the 11th Chief Justice of India and the sixth Vice President of India, Syed Hasan Imam, President of the Indian National Congress in 1918, Saifuddin Kitchlew, a founding member of Jamia Millia Islamia, Sir Syed Sultan Ahmed, the first Indian Vice-Chancellor of Patna University, Jaffer Rahimtoola, a former Mayor of Bombay, Badruddin Tyabji, the first Indian to practice as a barrister of the High Court of Bombay, and Syed Ali Zaheer, Law Minister in the first cabinet of Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru.
According to a study by Waqar A Khan, founder of Bangladesh Forum for Heritage Studies, after the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 the distance, time, and cost of travelling between India and Britain got considerably reduced along with rapid modernisation of steamship navigation via the high seas. This encouraged Indian students to travel in relative comfort to attend prestigious colleges and universities in Britain to obtain higher degrees to qualify in the professions of law, civil service, medical science, engineering, and financial management. After becoming barristers, Indians started returning home with legal skills, determined to face the forbidding challenges of a colonial society with boldness.
Gradually, a new era of political consciousness and nationalism dawned in British India in which they played a leading role, with several entering politics as ardent nationalists, devout revolutionaries, and prominent politicians. Considered the most educated region, the early barristers from East Bengal between 1866 and 1920 included Ganendra Mohan Tagore, the first Indian and Asian to qualify as a barrister in 1862; Manmohan Ghose, the first ‘practicing’ Indian barrister who joined the Calcutta High Court in 1886. Indians who became barristers from Lincoln’s Inn, Gray’s Inn, Inner Temple, and Middle Temple in London numbered 52 during that period. Among them were 16 Muslims. In 1880 alone, nine Indians qualified to be barristers, a record number for a particular year of whom seven were Muslims.
It was British India’s only elite profession where an Indian barrister could enjoy professional autonomy while in service, and did not have to kowtow to the colonial administration like in the other services, including the Imperial/Indian Civil Service (ICS), Waqar Khan wrote in The Daily Star. The National Judicial Academy (NJA) was set up in 1993 with the Chief Justice of India as the Chairman of its General Body, Governing Council, Executive Committee, and Academic Council. Fully funded by the Union government, its academic staff includes three professors, six assistant professors, research fellows, and law associates. The 63-acre campus on the outskirts of Bhopal has residential facilities for 144 participants, a well-endowed library, conference and seminar rooms, and a state-of-the-art auditorium. The campus also has a 280-seater state-of-the-art stand-alone auditorium.
Its academic programs are guided by the National Judicial Education Strategy (NJES) which was developed in September 2006 and began getting implemented in January 2007. Currently, no Muslim is among the 27 members of its Governing Bodies. The same is the case with its directors who to date numbered 11. The National Legal Services Authority (NALSA), a statutory body established in November 1995 to provide free legal services to “eligible” candidates, speedy disposal of cases, and reduce the burden of the judiciary, had seen nine member-secretaries since its inception which includes one Muslim – GM Akbar Ali for a year in 2008. One of its 31 Executive Chairpersons had been a Muslim – Justice Atlamas Kabir. None of its 12 members presently are Muslims. In the states, it has 74 Executive Chairpersons and member secretaries, of whom only four are Muslims.
The number of officials at the Supreme Court’s Secretary-General’s office stands at 151, of whom four are Muslims including Mazhar Khan, Chief Librarian at Judges Library, Mohammed Alam Khan, OSD (Registrar), and TU Islam Rajput, Registrar (Judicial Administration). The International Council of Arbitration (ICA), established in 1965 in New Delhi as a specialised arbitral body as an initiative of the Union government and apex business organisations like FICCI, is working to promote “amicable, quick and inexpensive” settlement of commercial disputes by arbitration, and conciliation, regardless of the location. Today, ICA is one of the most important arbitration centres in the Asia-Pacific region, handling more than 400 domestic and international arbitration cases each year.
It also provides Maritime Arbitration services and imparts education and training in Alternative Dispute Resolution mechanisms. The not-for-profit body has 10 branches in a pan-India network. Fifteen of its 440 arbitrators (advocates) as of mid-December 2024 are Muslims. Out of 216 Arbitrators (Judges), 13 are Muslims. Its six international advisory panel members have two Muslims from outside India. The Bar Association of India (BAI) – not to be confused with the Bar Council of India (BCI) – is the country’s premier voluntary organisation of the legal profession and Federation of Bar Associations, including District Bar Associations, High Court Bar Associations, Supreme Court Bar Association. Established in August 1959, it was formally inaugurated a year later. Its Executive Committee is elected by the Governing Council every two years, with the presidents of all High Court Bar Associations and the Advocate-Generals of the States and Union Territories (UTs) as ex officio members. The representative voluntary body of the Indian legal profession has now seen eight chiefs with no Muslim on board. The office-bearers and members of its Executive Committee in total number 64, of whom one is a Muslim, Joint Treasurer.
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