Yatin Oza, an advocate was stripped of his senior advocate designation earlier this year. Oza then filed a petition for restoration of his “senior-advocate” designation. The said advocate was earlier found guilty of contempt by the Gujarat High Court.
In the month of October, the advocate was found guilty of contempt case by a division bench of Hon’ble Justices Sonia Gokani and NV Anjaria.
Oza, who has been the president of Gujarat HC advocates association for more than two decades found the support of senior lawyers like AM Singhvi, CA Sundaram and Arvind Datar. They said that the punishment given to him in the form of stripping him of the designation is disproportionate to his behavior and that he was already fined with Rs. 2000 under Contempt of Court Act and sentenced till the rising of the court.
The Court said that if a person finds everything wrong with the institutions, then he is furthering the cause of anarchy.
The bench led by Hon’ble Justice Kaul agreed that the punishment must be in proportion to the crime. But the fact that it was the unanimous decision of the Gujarat HC to strip him of the designation means something must have really perturbed them. They were really pained by Oza’s behavior.
Justice Kaul further added that when a person of Oza’s stature and experience behaves in an unruly an contemptuous manner, it sets a wrong example for the junior advocates.
