Lawyers take their protest in the courtroom on security issue

Lawyers protesting the introduction of new "high security zone" in the Supreme Court today took their grievances in the courtroom alleging they were being harassed by security personnel.

No sooner a Bench headed by chief justice KG Balakrishnan assembled for the day's proceedings, the Supreme Court Bar Association mentioned the issue of proximity card introduced for allowing the entry of lawyers in the court complex.

The Supreme Court Bar Association office bearers, including its president MN Krishnamani and vice president Priya Hingorani, said proximity cards have been issued only to its members whereas those advocates who have their membership issued by the respective State Bar Councils are facing tremendous problem in gaining entry to the court complex.

Senior advocate Rajiv Dhavan said junior advocates associated with senior counsel are not the members of SCBA and they are facing a lot of problems.

Another lawyer DK Garg pointed to the plight of court clerks saying many of them were not issued proximity cards and security personnel were not accepting the identification cards issued to them earlier.

Realising the seriousness of the situation, the CJI said though there should not be any objection to upgrading of security measures, efforts would be made to minimise the problems raised by the lawyers.