Report No. 72

5. Present provision salutary.-

The position, as it emerges the light of the new article, is that a person who, after the commencement of the Constitution, has held office as a permanent Judge of a High Court is debarred from practising in any court or before any authority in India except the Supreme Court and the other High Courts. The provision as it stands, in our opinion, is of a salutary nature. There is no bar to a person practising in the Supreme Court and the other High Courts after having held the office of a permanent Judge of a High Court. To allow a person after he has been a permanent Judge of a High Court to practise in that very court or in a court subordinate to that court is bound to result in embarrassing and undesirable situations.

There are immense potentialities of abuse and also, possibly, of mischief in permitting such a course. It is also bound to detract from the dignity which attaches to the office of Judgeship. The imposition of a time lag between the date on which a person ceases to hold office of High Court Judge and the date on which he resumes practice would not confer propriety on a course which is inherently undesirable.