Ajay Mehta and Others vs State

K. Sreedhar Rao, J.—Revision filed against the order of the XXI Additional City Civil and Sessions Judge and Special Judge in Special Case No. 131 of 1997. On 20-9-2002 the accused 1 was present before the Court. Accused 2 to 4 were absent. An application was filed for exemption by Smt. Vanitha, a junior colleague of Sri Dhanraj. It is unfortunate, on the previous day, Sri Dhanraj had expired. The Trial Court took exception that the Junior Counsel has no authority to represent the accused to file an exemption application, thus rejected the application and issued non-bailable warrant Being aggrieved, the present revision is filed.

The impugned order of the Trial Court appears to be palpably erroneous. May be some technical lapse might have occurred on the part of the Junior Counsel in not filing a memo of appearance along with the exemption application. The Court should have considered the matter liberally in the facts and circumstances of the case. Unlike in civil cases, it is not necessary in criminal case that a vakalath has to be filed. In criminal cases, it is sufficient if a memo of appearance is filed by an Advocate with a declaration that he has instructions from his client to represent him in the case. Such memo of appearance enables sufficient authority and power to represent the accused. The contents of memo of appearance cannot be challenged by the prosecution. It is only the accused for whose benefit the memo is filed can challenge. In the given set of the legal propositions, the Court was not proper in rejecting the application for exemption.

Accordingly, the revision is allowed. The order of the Trial Court is set aside. The non-bailable warrant issued against the petitioners is recalled.