The Supreme Court dismissed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by Advocate Pradeep Kumar Jha seeking to obtain ex-gratia amount for kin of lawyers.
On Tuesday, the Apex Court heard the PIL filed by Yadav wherein he prayed for the Centre to pay an ex-gratia amount of Rs. 50 Lakhs to the kin of Advocates under 60 years of age and suffered death caused by Covid – 19 or other such reasons. The Court dismissed the petition by stating that, “If you are in black coat doesn’t mean your life is more precious than others”.
Justice DY Chandrachud also noticed that the grounds on which the compensation was claimed were totally irrelevant thereby implying that the grounds to the PIL were merely the work of cut-copy-paste. “If we see your grounds, there isn’t even one ground which is relevant. Aap agar cut-copy-paste kar denge toh aisa nahi hota ki Judges padhenge nahi.” Stated Justice Chandrachud.
Yadav requested to withdraw the Petition and file a fresh petition to which the Court denied and stated that, “It won’t happen that lawyers file a PIL and demand for compensation from the Judges and they will allow. A lot of people died. You can’t be an exception.” Further Justice Chandrachud observed that, “We will have to stop lawyers from filing these bogus PILs. This is a publicity Interest Litigation.”
The Bench also stated that in compliance with an earlier Judgment given by the Supreme Court, compensation to victims of Covid-19 shall be available under the National Disaster Management Act, 2005. Therefore, no additional Petition shall be entertained.
A cost of Rs. 10,000/- was levied on Yadav for filing such a bogus PIL by cut-copy-paste method, thereby dismissing the Petition. The cost shall be paid within one week time.