13 Reasons why Lawyers in India should be allowed to Advertise

Update According to the India Law Journal in its issue 2, volume 2, "Bar Council
allows lawyers to allow advertise their services on the internet"(sic)

The Bar Council of India has finally allowed lawyers to advertise their services on the
internet in this era of globalization. This move has come late as firms abroad have
been advertising their services since more than a decade. This decision was
informed by the BCI to the Supreme Court after an affidavit was filed through its
secretary Mr. S. Radhakrishnan. However, as decided in the case of V.B. Joshi v.
Union of India, where this amendment was made in Rule 36, Section IV, only 5
pieces of information can be advertised on the internet i.e. (1) name of the firm, (2)
address, telephone numbers and email id, (3) (a) enrollment number, (b) date of
enrollment, (c) name of State Bar Council where originally enrolled, (d) name of the
State Bar Council on whose roll name stands currently and (e) name of the Bar
Association of which the advocate is a member, (4) professional qualifications and
academic qualifications and (5) areas of practice."

According to the newspaper 'Economic Times', "Under the amended rule, advocates
can mention in their chosen websites, their names, telephone numbers, e-mail ID,
professional qualification and areas of specialisation".

It is interesting that such a vaguely worded statement was filed by the bar council in
an affidavit, and the hearing of the case was postponed indefinitely. I think that this
means that lawyers can put up banner advertisements on any website showing the
permitted information. This is in fact being done on many websites today, including
on google, and on a popular web directory which has hired Amitabh Bachchan to
appear in its advertisements.

The Bar Council of India states in the rules as laid down in its code of ethics in the
section called "An Advocate's duty towards Colleagues" that " An Advocate shall not
solicit work or advertise, except through a medium maintained by the Bar Council of
India, either directly or indirectly, whether by circulars, advertisements, touts,
personal communications, interviews not warranted by personal relations, furnishing
or inspiring newspaper comments or producing his/her photographs to be published
in connection with cases in which he/she has been engaged or concerned. His/her
sign-board or name-plate should be of a reasonable size. The sign-board or name-
plate or stationery should not indicate that he/she is or has been a President or
Member of a Bar Council or of any Association or that he/she has been associated
with any person or organisation or with any particular cause or matter or that he/she
specialises in any particular type of work or that he/she has been a Judge or an
Advocate General."


Here it is clarified by the Bar Council that, "Soliciting work or 'advertise' as used in
this clause of the Code would not mean and include setting up of a web-site by an
advocate or a law firm giving only basic information about the names and number of
lawyers in a law firm, the contact details and areas of practice."

If you are a young lawyer reading this, you may feel upset about this and say "Tough
luck but rules are rules". If this writer happens to be somewhere around you he
would probably say "Really? What rules?" Let me try and list down the number of
ways in which I can prove that this rule is totally misconceived, impracticable, and
indeed is being violated even as you read these words and try to get a grip on the
spirit behind these words.

1) Are you telling me that if a lawyer becomes a law minister and does not stop
practicing law, knowing that he is getting newspaper comments and headlines about
him and his acts every day, this is ethical, and does not violate his duty towards his
colleagues? Are you saying that you can call such behaviour ethical and call a
'lesser' lawyer's advertisement on the internet unethical?

1a) Replace 'law minister' with 'additional solicitor general', 'solicitor general',
'science and technology minister', 'governor', 'leader of the opposition', 'Rajya Sabha
member', 'chief minister', 'home minister', 'finance minister', and any other title you
can think of which has adorned a lawyer who went on to not quit law practice. Then
repeat the question which has been asked at the end of point no 1 above.

1b) Does the BCI really feel that if a person does not tell people that he or she has
been a judge or an advocate-general people will not come to know this fact? What
does it feel about the Supreme Court putting up a list of lawyers on its website and
stating loudly and clearly that these people are senior advocates, and that such and
such senior advocate is a retired judge, a retired chief justice, or a retired advocate
general? Will such information printed on a visiting card amount to more undue
publicity than if it is published on the Supreme Court website, (as it has indeed
been)?

2) A firm of lawyers describes itself on a website owned or at least operated by it as
the oldest law firm in India and goes on to state that it "boasts of an unparalleled
legal tradition of being the legal advisor for the East India Company" inter alia, and
then goes on to list its achievements tangible and intangible/unverifiable on its
home page (viewed on 4th October 2013). (interestingly this firm was founded in
1896 according to its own website, and the East India Company was dissolved in
1874 according to the wikipedia page which pertains to that company). Is this self-
publicising behaviour not against the word and spirit of the code of ethics of the bar
council? If such behaviour can go unnoticed or unpunished then why are young
lawyers afraid of advertising on the internet?

2a) Other firms are doing similar things. For example, there is one firm called x and
y. It claims on its website (viewed on 4th October 2013) that "The members of the
Firm offer its clientele high quality expertise derived from immense transactional
experience". Is this not self-praise? Is this not an attempt at advertisement? (Let us
assume for a moment here that not all people are aware of the fact that self-praise is
no recommendation.)


3) Let us assume that one company makes a website which is totally according to
BCI rules. You can look at the website of a company called Trilegal. I think that this
website is a clear example of a website which does not even reach the envelope of
the BCI rules, leave alone push it. Let us assume that there are other such sites.
Now what is there in the BCI rules to stop such a website from spending a crore
rupees on search engine optimisation and reaching the first page of Google's
results? How can the BCI stop this when there is no agreed definition of what is and
what is not search engine optimisation? How can you monitor or detect it even if you
can define it?

3a) What about if some lawyer sets up a facebook page, and provides only his
name, phone number, educational qualifications, years of experience, and area of
practice on it. Now he goes on and spends a crore rupees on a facebook ad
campaign to get a couple of million likes. Now he has a captive audience of about 3
to 4 lakh persons. How can the BCI stop this? Is this stoppable?

3b) What about those lawyers who advertise on google? How about if some lawyer
does not put ads/links/ads-cum-links to his website on google but puts them on
thousands of other websites? This can be done very easily today. How will you
monitor the whole internet for such ads?

3c) How about if somebody sets up a website which is for the general public, and
appears to be real and useful on the face of it, but is actually a vehicle for an
individual practice? There are such sites. I sent a protest to a website called
498a.org about how unknown people were cutting and pasting my work from my
website to their website without my permission. I sent this comment using their
contact us form. In reply I got a thinly disguised advertisement for a particular firm of
lawyers and a link to their website.

4) What about if some lawyer has a friend who becomes an editor in a weekly
supplement in a national newspaper? How can you prove that the weekly advice
column which he has been granted by the editors of this paper has not been
'inspired' by him? How do you stop such behaviour?

5) What do you do if there is an internationally famous rape case? Famous to such
an extent that the local bar association passes a resolution prohibiting any of its
members from accepting the brief of the accused men (for reasons best known to
itself). Now comes a man who turns up in court having practically grabbed a brief
which others are bound not to accept by the above resolution. Can anybody smell
any collusion or illegality here? What do you call the resultant widespread
newspaper comments? Inspired comments? Natural publicity?

6) Is not the BCI instruction to lawyers to not put any material on their website other
than their names and address in direct conflict with its instruction to lawyers to
provide free advice to needy persons?

7) What about those men and women who provide advice on forums on the internet?
Do you call these "interviews not warranted by personal relations"? Or do you call
this free legal advice to needy persons? How do you expect the lawyers amongst
these persons to expect that their advice will be taken seriously if they do not provide
their name and contact details?