GHCAA President Yatin Oza No Longer Senior Advocate; Development Follows After the Gujarat HC Withdraws His Senior Designation.
July 21, 2020, TuesdayAnjana GopinathThe High Court of Gujarat has taken away the senior designation of Adv. Yatin Oza, the President of the Gujarat High Court Advocates’ Association (GHCAA). The present development has occurred following the initiation of contempt proceedings against him over his remarks and allegations made against the Court Registry in a Facebook live video.
The lawyer, in his live video, had made allegations against the High Court and its registry, which included statements like corrupt practices adopted by the Registry of the High Court of Gujarat; undue favour shown to high-profile industrialists, smugglers, and traitors; that High Court is functioning for influential and rich people and their advocates; that Billionaires walk away with orders from the High Court in two days whereas the poor and the non-VIPs need to suffer and also remarks that if the litigants wanted to file any matter in the High Court, he has to be either Mr. Khambhata or the builder or the company.
The Bench of the Gujarat High Court, comprising of Justices Sonia Gokani and N V Anjaria while taking Suo-moto cognizance of the incident, opined that the lawyer had behaved in the most frivolous manner, and has leveled false and contemptuous allegations of corruption and malpractices against the administration of the Court.
The Court also stated that the baseless accusations have attempted to cause serious damage to the prestige of the Court. The Bench observed that “...the Court in the exercise of its powers granted under Article 215 of the Constitution of India, prima facie finds him responsible for committing criminal contempt of this Court within the meaning of Section 2 (c) of the Contempt of Courts Act, and takes cognizance of such criminal contempt against him under Section 15 of the Act.”
Even though Oza had subsequently challenged the order of the High Court before the Supreme Court, the Apex court had expressed its unwillingness to entertain the plea and had also asked him to take the matter to the High Court itself, following which he withdrew his petition.
Earlier in June, Oza had presented his resignation from the President position he held at GHCAA on the basis of differences that existed within the Association. However, he withdrew the same owing to the requests made by several members of the Association.
