Allegations of transfer of BCI assets to trust matter of concern: Supreme Court

Bar Council of India chairman Manan Kumar Mishra.

NEW DELHI: Supreme Court said Wednesday allegations of Bar Council of India’s assets being transferred to a trust created by the BCI chairperson are a matter of concern and it has to be examined. SC also agreed to examine whether it has the power to establish and regulate law colleges and universities.The court was hearing petitions questioning the functioning of BCI-Pearl First Trust and the establishment of law colleges by the trust. It sought BCI’s response on the issues within two weeks. A bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana asked how BCI can be considered an expert body to regulate legal education when law scholars and academics are better suited to deal with academic matters. “How can BCI regulate law colleges? That’s the real question. Their statutory role comes into existence only after one gets a licence. So the issue is whether law schools can be regulated. We’d like to examine whether BCI has the power to control and regulate universities/law colleges,” the bench said.

Advocates Prashant Bhushan and Pranav Sachdeva, appearing for petitioner Girish Mittal, said BCI passed a resolution in 2016 and abolished an earlier trust and transferred the funds to a new trust ‘Bar Council of India Trust for Promotion of Education, Legal and Professional Reforms and Improvement in Research’. They said the trust established one law college each in Goa and Andhra Pradesh. BCI, however, said the Bar body has passed a resolution providing that there would be no lifetime trustees and that the tenure of trustees would be coterminous with their membership of BCI.SC had earlier said BCI chairperson Manan Kumar Mishra’s position was only “pro tem” until a freshly constituted lawyers’ body elects its office bearers. Mishra was first elected as BCI chairperson till 2012. Though he briefly demitted office in 2014, he returned as chairperson in Nov that year and has remained in the post since then.