Top lawyers convicted in BMW case

Taking strong note on the corrupt precedent, the Delhi High Court has convicted country’s two top lawyers – R K Anand and I U Khan – for alleged role in the BMW case. They are convicted on the basis of an NDTV expose done in May 2007 in which they were shown as colluding with the witness. Both Anand and Khan were accused of obstructing the administration of justice by allegedly influencing a witness Sunil Kulkarni in the sensational 9-year-old BMW hit-and-run case.

On May 31, 2007, the Delhi High Court had taken suo motu cognisance of the sting operation showing Anand, in collusion with Khan, allegedly offering money to Kulkarni to depose in favour of Sanjeev Nanda, the prime accused in the hit-and-run case.

"They are senior advocates and they did not tender either conditional or unconditional apology for their conduct in the BMW case," a Division Bench of Justices Manmohan Sarin and Madan B Lokur said, in their 112-page verdict in the contempt case relating to the expose.

The court has recommended that the two advocates be stripped of their designation of senior advocate and asked them not to appear in the Delhi High Court and its subordinate courts for the next four months as punishment.

The court also slapped a fine of Rs 2,000 on each of them and rapped them for their "irresponsible" behaviour. The Bench said: "we are not dealing with young lawyers. Both are seasoned lawyers and such conduct was not expected of them."

We should remember that Sanjeev Nanda, the grandson of retired Naval chief SM Nanda, is accused of mowing down six persons, including three policemen, with his BMW car on January 10, 1999.

The judgment is well founded as it sets the precedent that lawyers are not above law, and if the senior lawyers like Anand and Khan could act like that, there is highly likely chance of justice being sold and bought in favour of the rich and the powerful.

Due to sting operation, the world could know how corrupt and shameless our judicial system has become and how even the old and senior advocates go about making out-of-the-court settlements. Certainly, if that day when the two advocates wee shown in collusion for a corrupt cause was a dark day in Indian judicial history, then this day is surely a historic one when the court punished the accused for their misdemeanour.