Maharashtra Allows All Advocates Registered With Bar Council Of Maharashtra & Goa To Travel In Locals During Non-Peak Hours On An Experimental Basis [Read Order]

Bombay High Court has already passed orders dated September 15 and October 9, first allowing lawyers appearing in physical hearing before the High Court to travel in local trains and then allowing lawyers in the Mumbai Metropolitan region to travel in locals along with registered clerks.

In the previous hearing, Court had asked the State to decide along with all stakeholders to consider allowing lawyers to travel in locals for professional work unrelated to Court.

On Wednesday, Kishor Raje Nimbalkar, Secretary, Disaster Management, Relief & Rehabilitation, passed the order. The order states-

"In view of peculiar facts and circumstances which need not be spelt out herein, only on experimental basis, on and from the date of receipt of appropriate approval from the railway Authorities till November 23, 2020 midnight, all lawyers registered with the Bar Council of Maharashtra and Goa are hereby allowed to use local train services subject to the following conditions, which are conjunctive and not disjunctive, meaning thereby that each and every condition set out hereunder will apply -

(i) The Lawyers and registered clerks will be allowed to use local train services on all working days only during non-peak hours, ie.

1. Upto 8 AM in the morning

2. Between 11 am to 4 pm

3. On and from 7 pm till plying of the last local train of the day

(ii) The facility made available by this order cannot be availed for undertaking travel during peak hours on any ground whatsoever and or for any reason whatsoever.

(iii) Monthly passes will not be issued

(iv) For each journey, a separate one way ticket will have to be bought/purchased.

(v) The train ticket as aforesaid will be sold only upon production of a valid identity card issued by the Bar Council of Maharashtra and Goa in the case of the lawyers and by the Bombay High Court registry in the case of registered clerks.

(vi) The ticket for one-way travel so purchased is non-transferrable and cannot be used by anybody else than the person to whom it is sold, ie, the lawyer or the registered clerk as the case may be.

(vii) The facility made available by this order can be availed only when such a travel is necessary for professional work and not for any private work/reason and not for any private or non-professional purpose.

(viii) Each lawyer and/or registered clerk will have to wear a badge, provided by the Bar Council of Maharashtra and Goa, at a prominent place on his dress/clothes, whereby it becomes easy to for law enforcement agencies to identify the traveller.

(ix) All travellers availing the facility made available by this order shall strictly comply with the guidelines issued by the State government from time to time applicable to such travelling such as compulsory, continuous and proper wearing of face cover, maintaining social distancing all the time and frequent use of hand sanitizer etc

(x) Anybody who violates any of the terms and conditions subject to which the facility is made available by this order, will be liable for a strict disciplinary action at the hand of the Bombay High Court and/or the Bar Council of Maharashtra and Goa."