Senior Lawyers Can't Take Lion's Share Of Court Time: Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court has implored senior advocates to keep in mind the court's time constraints, saying they should cooperate with a greater sense of responsibility and not take away the "lion's share of the court's time".

In its order on a plea related to an intellectual property rights case, the High Court said lawyers would like to argue till the "cows come home" which cannot be permitted as a large number of matters is listed each day.

The counsel should realise, the court said, the first date when a case is listed is the date for preliminary hearing and not a date for adjudication.

"We all have to be mindful of the fact that a large number of other matters are listed on the day when the appeal is listed for preliminary hearing. Just because senior counsel appear on either side, who are ready to fight till the last, they cannot take away the lion's share of the court's time," a bench of Justices Vipin Sanghi and Jasmeet Singh said.

The bench observed that particularly in matters relating to intellectual property rights, its experience has been that the matters are contested vociferously.

On the first date when the appeal is listed, in case the court is not inclined to interfere with the impugned order (which is under challenge), the counsel for the appellant who invariably is a senior counsel, presses for arguing the matter till the court agrees with him or her, it said.

"Similarly, when the court is inclined to stay the operation of the impugned order or any part of it, counsel for the respondent would like to argue the matter till the cows come home. This cannot be permitted," the bench said.

"In our view, once we have heard the submissions at some length and perused the impugned order and other relevant documents, and appreciated the relevant law prima facie, and convey the course of actions that we propose to adopt, the counsels should relent. "Unfortunately, that does not happen invariably. We implore the members of the Bar, particularly the senior counsel, to keep the constraints of time of the court in mind and to cooperate with the court with a greater sense of responsibility," the bench said in its order.

The bench made the remarks while hearing an appeal challenging a single-judge order which had restrained Hindustan Unilever Ltd, which manufactures Domex toilet cleaning products, from publishing four advertisements.

The single judge had also directed the company to remove all references to the product of Reckitt Benckiser (India) Pvt Ltd, that is, Harpic or the bottle which was held to be deceptively similar to the registered mark of the plaintiff (Reckitt Benckiser).

The division bench, in an interim order, stayed the single judge's injunction order regarding three advertisements and said that the stay on one advertisement will continue and listed the appeal for further hearing on March 16.

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