22,000 lawyers on Kerala’s bar council rolls unaccounted for
Over 22,000 lawyers in Kerala remain unaccounted for after failing to complete a mandatory law degree verification process. The Bar Council of Kerala plans to implement an AI-assisted system to prevent unauthorized individuals from filing petitions in court.
Why it matters
Ensures the integrity of the legal profession and judicial processes by verifying the credentials of practicing attorneys.
Over 22,000 Kerala lawyers, who are on the rolls of the Bar Council of Kerala (BCK), have skipped the law degree verification process. Going by the latest figures, there are around 81,000 lawyers on the rolls of the council. Only those lawyers who have got their law degrees verified and obtained the Certificates of Practice (CoP) will be allowed to file petitions for their clients in future.
The mammoth exercise for verifying the degree certificates and issuance of CoP gathered momentum a few years ago when complaints of fake lawyers practising in various courts came up. Also, the demand for cleaning up the voters’ list ahead of Bar Council elections necessitated speeding up of verification process. However, the process could not be completed on time due to a host of factors, including the delay in getting the degree certificates from various universities verified, legal sources indicated.
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