A Tribute to Advocate C.V. Francis, 1st August 1935- 10th February 2026
It was April 1989. Hardly, one year into the profession, I was chamber less, without a senior and in a city which I had never ever lived, but for the last one year. I was with a direction but without a boat to embark on this journey.
It is here that my good friend and law classmate, Mathew Vellapally came to my rescue. He assured me that he will persuade advocate C.V. Francis with whom he recently got acquainted to take me into his chamber. I had only heard of CV Francis as an accomplished civil lawyer from a very old clerk in the district courts.
My friend took me to the chamber of Mr. Francis. Mr. Francis had a strikingly handsome face with light skin and sharp features, almost like a Greek sculpture perfectly chiselled from marble. As a man of impeccable manners, he stood up on his polio affected legs and greeted me warmly. He spoke to me both in English and in Malayalam with a Thrissur Nazrani accent which I was familiar with. He requested me to join on court reopening in July.
My friend Mathew later persuaded him to take me in immediately, fearing, I guess me going astray or changing my views on the profession. Francis relented. Thereafter, I was inducted into his chamber number 148 in the Delhi High Court, I guess it was the beginning of May 1989.
He was known and always called “Chettan”, meaning elder brother by his younger brothers, chamber colleagues, the staff and almost every lawyer junior to him.
He came from an educated family of modest means in Thrissur. He studied in St Stephen's Delhi. He later joined the Chamber of the eminent original side lawyer, Radhey Shyam about whom he had delightful and affectionate anecdotes to recount. Radhey Shyam was the father of another brilliantly sensational original side practitioner, senior advocate Arun Mohan.
In a couple of weeks, I was asked to go to the Civil Judge, (then called sub-judge) in the Tis Hazari courts and argue for an ad-interim injunction against a proposed demolition. I was reading through the file in this 160 ft.² chamber with no walls or barriers where everybody could see everyone. Chettan was, I guess, observing me. I am sure that my face displayed extreme anxiety and nervousness. Chettan looked at me from his table and told me something which I can never forget for the rest of my living life, “argue the matter to the best of your abilities, and don't be afraid that just because you did not get an injunction, I will lose a client.” Those words still ring in my ears.
It was impossible in those days to get an ex-parte order in the district courts. With trepidation, I went to the court of the Sub Judge. A kindly Sikh gentleman presided over it. And I am sure, he granted me an injunction not by the merit of my arguments, but as a means of encouraging a junior in the profession.
When I got back, Chettan asked me what happened. I informed him that the court granted the injunction. He promptly told me that I needed to carry out the Order 39 Rule 3 compliances. I responded that I had completed it. Chettan knew that this meant I went to a typist under a tree in the Tis Hazari court premises, got a letter typed addressed to the defendant, sent by registered post the complete set of photocopied documents, got the postal registration slip, got another affidavit typed under the very same tree and duly lodged it in the court. Thus, began a wonderful five and half year journey of trust and confidence in the chamber of C.V.Francis.
I began to understand the rigorous routine of my senior, who, despite his physical handicap could rise up as a Malayali lawyer on the original side of the Delhi High Court. He would wake up every day between 5:00 and 5:30 AM. He filled up two shorthand notebooks in his impeccably clear handwriting. These two notebooks kept two stenographers busy for the whole day.
I also learnt the clever and camouflaged way of pleadings. On one occasion, I saw the one innocuously worded sentence he wrote in the written statement had collapsed the trial of a suit as the plaint stood exposed as a figleaf of legal illiteracy.
As a man dedicated to perfection, the dictionary was always by his side. The drafts went through from several revisions to almost a dozen. In the age of the typewriter, this meant the nightmarish retyping of the entire pleadings all over again and again. Neither cost nor time deterred him to pursue the perfect draft.
He read extensively from Laski to Denning and everything in between. He taught us to be a 'good lawyer' in every sense of the term.
CV's friendly disposition made his chamber a beehive for Malayali lawyers, who had work in the Delhi High Court. Many used his chamber for receiving postal communications, using his stenographers and also gave tasks to his juniors like me and my senior chamber mate Ramesh Babu, a much- accomplished lawyer, ever helpful colleague and a friend for life.
Sometimes, for an hour or two in the day, his chamber would, with visiting former chamber mates and other lawyers, turn into a political hot house of the most contentious of debates. It would often be triggered by something dramatic happening on the political front. Keralites have very strong political opinions ranging from the extreme left to the centre to the right. The chamber was the very microcosm of the society.
Chettan, I believed belonged to the humanitarian liberal persuasion. He had faith in the welfare state. He expected governments to provide the 'greatest good to the greatest number' and expected politicians to perform the duty of providing human development metrics to its citizenry. He did not fall prey to cynicism. He, infact, admired the generation of leaders who built Kerala's much touted welfare state. Yet, he graciously accepted arguments of all hues.
It goes to the credit of my senior that all the contentious debates were conducted most boisterously, but without rancour and in the most civil manner. And in the end, the protagonists continued remaining friends with their antagonists. That was the beauty of Chettan's chamber.
Chettan seldom drank, and if needed only parsimoniously for an occasion. However, when I visited him in the evenings, 'Chechi' (Mrs. Maggie Francis) would ask me if I would have a cup of tea. Chettan, would jocularly interject, “no he will have a drink with me”.
Looking back at the loss of Chettan, all I can gather from my reflections of the bygone years is that he made this tortuous journey in this profession so easy, pleasant and most importantly, meaningful for all of us.
Author is a Senior Advocate practicing at Supreme Court of India. Views are personal