Lawyers as Social Engineers
Let’s have a look at what lawyers are doing today
With Corona virus hitting the world, Indian lawyers have stepped in to take up social responsibility in a big way. There are about 20 lakh lawyers across the country. There are more than 100 big law firms with more than 100 lawyers each. Lawyers in India are not only litigators but also advisors to big corporate houses. They assist the government to make policies. Indian lawyers represent their clients not only in India but in various courts and forums worldwide.
With the spread of Corona virus, Lawyers have taken up the social responsibility in a big way. As the perception goes that all lawyers are rich, its not so. Many lawyers are earning very less. Lawyers from across the country come to the Capital to practice in Supreme Court of India. They have to struggle for minimum of two to three years to earn a living and a decent meal for their family. Many a time’s young lawyers take up internship without any remuneration.
To help and encourage the needy and young lawyers, senior lawyers have opened up their wallets. Bar council of Delhi has announced Rupees Five Thousand grant to bonafide needy lawyers, BCD chairman K.C.Mittal informewd LAB news. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has also announced a welfare scheme for lawyers.
Let us look what some of the eminent lawyers have to say about Carona Virus complete shutdown.
We talked to about a dozen lawyers across the country, it was very encouraging to hear positive replies from them.
Mr Manoj Kumar, heading the law firm Hammurabi and Solomon said that he along with his wife Shweta Bharti, who is also a lawyer have taken up the decision of prime minister Mr Narender Modi to have a complete shutdown in a very positive way. We have a house in Sainik Farms which needs lots of maintenance, and yet we have sent our domestic workers, drivers, mali and others to their homes. We want them to be safe too. Now I along with my wife Shweta, Two daughters Manasvi (14) and Yashasvi (12) do all the household chores including watering the plants, cooking and dish washing. Cleaning and dusting the house is a big job, but we are enjoying doing it. It’s become so joyful to have the family working together, eating together, Mr Kumar said. “We have defined our daily responsibilities relating to home chores amongst the four of us under guidance of Shweta. On cooking specifically, I have the privilege to largely take care of cooking owing to my passion,” Mr Kumar said.
“ During working hours, time is being largely spent on handling ongoing work from home. All team and client coordination over video-conferencing/webex from home.
All spare time goes into doing activities/games with family, reading and my other passion – cinema, in that order,” he said.
“Clients are continuously consulting us on ongoing assignments, implications of developments triggered by the lock down and a wide variety of crisis management counseling.
I am not at all happy with the situation.The speed at which the Covid19 developments have overtaken us shows how rapidly normal working can be overtaken by fear and then how rapidly even fear can be overtaken by grief without giving enough time to us to anticipate, understand and re calibrate themselves to face the challenging times that lie ahead. I wish we were better prepared. But for our already leveraged and deep working with technology tools, it would have been far more difficult to continue to work and ensure minimal hardship to our clients.
Mr Manoj Kumar said, “Access to justice has been one of the most critical casualties of these sudden developments owing to the pandemic. Government should work deeper with the legal professions, i.e both the bar and the bench, to build-in processes and capabilities necessary for continuity of access to justice in times of disaster going forward. Governments should help judicial bodies strengthen remote working capability tools and technologies along with virtual working capabilities with cloud-based servers and data management. This will ensure irreparable hardships are not caused to litigants as a result of suspension of usual working of judicial bodies in times of disaster.
My advice to my fellow lawyers will be to invest time and resources to sharpen skills relating to professional working in times of disaster in order to enable better comprehension of impending hardships during challenging times, anticipation of fear and grief, understanding and acceptance of grief and handling grief in order to enable grief to give way to positivity and recovery.
Additionally, I would strongly recommend that lawyers must give equal importance to charity and social responsibilities as well as nurturing client and peer relationships during times of crisis. Lawyers must cater to both as part of their social and professional commitments.
Mr Manoj Kumar has given advance salaries to his employees along with many other things as per the need of the employee. He is always ready to help his co-workers, juniors and fellow lawyers.
Mr Manoj Kumar follows a daily routine of prayers. he has a beautiful temple in his house as well as in his office. Now I am only praying to God to end the crisis soon, Mr Kumar said.
