New Delhi, Sept 30: A division bench of Delhi High Court today gave a split verdict on Bar Council of India (BCI) vice chairman Adish C Aggarwalla's petition challenging Bar Council of Delhi (BCD) action disqualifying him from its membership and the issue may now go before a larger bench. In his judgement, Chief Justice B C Patel declared the BCD action as illegal and arbitrary while Justice A K Sikri gave a dissenting verdict. Now the Chief Justice will decide whether to refer the matter to a larger bench or not.

Meanwhile, Aggarwalla demanded that the issue be referred to a larger bench which should not have a judge whose relations were practising here, an issue against which he had been raising his voice.

While disqualifying Aggarwalla from its membership, the BCD had notified advocate Jatan Singh as having replaced him in the BCI as BCD's representative.
Alleging that the petitioner was not informed about the said three consecutive meetings or about his disqualification, Aggarwala's counsel Anil B Diwan had sought setting aside of the BCD action as being illegal and unconstitutional.

BCD should not have taken the impugned action without giving an opportunity to the petitioner to explain his position, Diwan had argued.
BCD's counsel V P Singh had submitted that Aggarwala failed to attend three consecutive meetings and thereby attracted disqualification.

Bureau Report