The central government issues guidelines for fair distribution of cases among panel lawyers

Cases are assigned to the panel lawyers by certain law officers or lawyers from among the panel lawyers themselves, who are designated as ‘Litigation In-Charge’ for the concerned court.

According to a circular released on October 16 by the Legal Affairs Department of the Ministry of Justice, these guidelines were issued after the department received complaints about unfair and opaque allocation of cases by the Litigation In-Charge.

According to the circular, the government has received such complaints from its panel advisors and also from the ministries/departments of the central government.

“Such practices are not only detrimental to other panel lawyers but also endanger the interests of the Union of India. Moreover, assigning ordinary/routine cases to a higher category of counsel creates unnecessary burden.” the circular said.