Acrimony and greed led members of same family declaring the other person dead so as to acquire the land and unscrupulous work by the lekpal (low-level bureaucrat) in maintaining the record books devoid a living person of Right to Life. This case brought into five major citation, those are, The Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993;The Indian Penal Code; Article 21 in The Constitution Of India 1949;Section 36 in The Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993;Section 14 in The Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993.

The plot of the whole story can be narrated in steps, as Lal Bihari took 18 years to get his identity back.

Phase 1

Lal Bihari approaches his birthplace Khalilabad for residence, income and caste certificates as He needed them to get a bank loan for his handloom business. On his arrival at the tehsildar’s office, he came to know that he has been dead since 30th July, 1976. His relatives had bribed the khatuni (record keeper) to declare him dead on the official papers and transfer one-fifths of the land to them. Shocked and shattered with the news, he started a new phase of life, which was regaining his identity.

Phase 2

Lal Bihari kidnapped his nephew and sent his shirt drenched with animals blood available at butcher’s shop. But he let the child go to his parents when didn’t register any case against him. If nephew’s parents would have registered a case against him then he would had a proof of his identity. After his nephew returned home, an article appeared in a regional newspaper called Swatantra Bharat and after hearing upon the news an MLA raised a question in the UP Assembly.

Phase 3

Lal Bihari got married at a young age, and applied for a widow pension for his wife hoping the government would rectify the mistake upon seeing him alive, but this also went in vain.

Phase 4

At this point Lal Bihari started to give when a politician named Shyam Lal appeared as a Guru to him and advised him to openly call him “Mritak”, as the passerby made fun of his identity and cracked joke on his situation. This idea appealed him so much so that he started the Mritak Sangh, an association of the living dead. But there was one problem: it had no members except him.

Phase 5

As the drama spurred at the Assembly, Lal Bihari sat on dharnas outside the Assemby in Lucknow. And finally got a visitor pass to enter the assembly, and heroically stood up from his place and sang the slogan of “Mujhe zinda karo” while the assembly was in session. He had to be thrown out of the assembly. He even bribed a police officer with 500 Rupees to register a case against him but it went into vain.

 Lal Bihari sold his property to contest the 1988 Lok Sabha election from Allahabad against former Prime Minister VP Singh.Surprising even himself, he got about 1,600 votes. In 1989, he filed nomination papers against Rajiv Gandhi in Amethi and then promptly filed an application for countermanding the election, as he was dead. It was not countermanded, of course, but he got written about. In 1994, finally he was declared alive and got his identity back.

Now Mritak Sangh is a popular community, which helps other people like Lal Bihari to earn justice who have been declared dead by the family members in lure of property.

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Few eminent lawyers who turned politicians and helped their political party to gain success and excel is structuring policies.

Subramanium Swamy

Son to Sitaraman Subramanian, a bureaucrat and Padmavathy a homemaker was not a lawyer by education. He has completed his doctorate degree in Economics from Harvard University and still teaches every summer session at Harvard two courses in Economics, one on mathematical methods, and another on China.  He entered politics in 1970 and stirred the national polictics by challenging Indira Gandhi’s Soviet influenced socialist planning. He has fought over 75 cases till now and he learned the nuances of law from eminent lawyers and now belongs to the elite group of lawyers.

Salman Khurshid

He is a senior advocate, eminent author and a law teacher. Salman Khurshid belongs to Indian National Congress. He started his political career in 1981 as an Officer on Special Duty in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) under the prime ministership of Indira Gandhi. In 2011, he was made Cabinet Minister for Law and Justice, and Minority Affairs in the Government of India. Sons of Babur, a play written by Salman Khurshid, has received widespread acknowledgement and has also been translated into several languages.

Arun Jaitley

A senior advocate of Delhi High Court who is presently the Finance Minister and Minister of Corporate Affairs of NDA led BJP government. He graduated in Commerce from Shri Ram College of Commerce, New Delhi in 1973. He passed his Law degree from the University of Delhi, in 1977. He was an Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) student leader in the Delhi University Campus in the seventies and rose to be the President of the Students Union of Delhi University in 1974. Jaitley has always emerged as a strategic planner of the BJP, helping his party member Narendra Modi wins the assembly election in 2002. As the General Secretary, he managed eight assembly elections, which proved victorious for the BJP. He was re-elected to the Rajya Sabha in April 2012 for his third term.

Palaniappan Chidambaram

Chidambaram is a corporate lawyer who started his career with practice at the Madras High Court. By 1984 he was a senior advocate. His offices were in Chennai and Delhi. Eventually he became a practicing lawyer in the Supreme Court and other High Courts in India. P. Chidambaram is a highly qualified person. He is a member of one of thelargest and oldest national party of India, the Indian National Congress. The last two terms of the UPA government, led by the Indian National Congress party, have seen P. Chidambaram holding many important positions.

Prashant Bhushan

A prominent member of Anna Hazare’s campaign and later became one of the co-founder of Aam Adami Party in 2012. In April, 2105 after the Delhi elections, he was voted out from AAP and formed a new political movement called Swaraj Abhiyan. He was enrolled to study engineering at IIT-Madras but quit after one semester and decided to do a two-year BSc programme with Philosophy, Economics and Political Science in Allahabad. During this period Mrs. Gandhi’s election case was taking place, and attended the hearings both in Allahabad and the Supreme Court and knew that he is only seeing a small part of Law because this was a high profile case. These incidents made him to study law for next three years and enrolled himself as an advocate in 1983. And presently, he is noted for his use of public interest litigation (PIL) to support a number of causes related to corruption, environmental protection and human rights.

Kapil Sibal

He is an Indian lawyer, politician, and government official who became a senior leader in the Indian National Congress (Congress Party). He was especially noted for his service as a cabinet minister in the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) coalition government (2004–14). He studied in St. Stephens College, University of Delhi, then completed his degree in law from Faculty of Law, University of Delhi and did MA in history as well. He joined the bar association in 1970. Afterwards, he attended the Harvard Law School where he enrolled for an LL.M. which he completed in 1977.^] He was designated as senior lawyer in 1983. In 1989, he was appointed the Additional Solicitor General of India. In 1994, he was the only lawyer to appear in the Parliament, and successfully defended a Supreme Court judge during impeachment proceedings.

These are few names who had studied law and came into politics, but this isn’t new for any democracy around the world. India before Independence had Jawaharlal Nehru, Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Vallahbhai Patel who were lawyers and helped India to achieve Independence as well shaped the political scenario. This can be evidently seen in American democracy where many presidents had background of legal education. We see many lawyers being the part of political movement because they are trained to be leaders who have wide perspectives of understanding people’s outcry and mould the regulations within the legal limits to help the people of the nation.

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Cornelia Sorabji

One must pray gratitude to this lady, who opened the doors for women to study law. She was the first female graduate from Bombay University, and in 1889 became the first woman to read law at Oxford University, and also the first Indian national to study at any British university.  When Cornelia Sorabji managed to accomplish this feat, she found male students slamming the lecture doors on her face because they did not want to give up their domain. In England, she was refused a scholarship simply because she was a woman, was not allowed to read in the Lincoln Library and had the hardest time sitting for the barrister’s examination. Yet her sheer determination and spunk saw her through and she went on to become the first female lawyer not only in India but also in England.

Anna Chandy

Anna Chandy, was the first female judge in India and also the first woman in India to become a high court judge. She did her post-graduate degree in 1926.  While practicing as a lawyer from 1929, she was actively involved in  promoting the cause of women’s rights and their legitimate role in the society. She is often described as a “first generation feminist”.

M. Fathima Beevi

Justice M. Fathima Beevi was the first woman judge to be appointed to the Supreme Court of India and the first Muslim woman to be appointed to any higher judiciary. She is the first woman judge of a Supreme Court of a nation in India and Asia. On her retirement from the court she served as a member of the National Human Rights Commission and as Governor in Tamil Nadu (1997–2001). While serving the post she rejected the mercy petitions of the four condemned prisoners associated with the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case. The mercy petitions were sent to the Governor by the prisoners for pleading her for exercising her power under Article 161 of the Constitution which is the power of the Governor to grant pardon.

Leila Seth

Justice Leila Seth was the first woman judge on the Delhi High Court and the first woman to become Chief Justice of a state High Court of Himachal Pradesh. She was the first woman to top the London Bar exams in 1958. Her excellence was in Tax matters (Income Tax, Sales Tax, Excise and Customs), Civil, Company and Criminal cases as also Matrimonial suits and writ petitions.

G. Rohini

A lady from Vishakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, who practised on issues related to protection of the girl child and working women, was appointed as a Judge of Andhra Pradesh High Court in 2001. Presently, she is the first female to be appointed as the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court on 21^st April 2014. She was also involved in legal journalism, as a reporter and executive editor of Andhra Pradesh Law Journals.

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The American television series on legal drama, Suits, has been created and written by Aaron Korsh. Aaron Korsh is the storywriter of famous television series called “Everybody loves Raymond”. The series focuses on Mike Ross (Patrick J. Adams), a brilliant young college dropout, who is recruited by New York City’s best legal closer, Harvey Specter (Gabriel Macht). Mike has the special ability of photographic memory, that is he can recreate the scene on the basis of evidence and deduction, and on the other hand Harvey has huge legal knowledge which makes me justice hungry, emotionless and cold-blooded shark. This makes the duo irreplaceable and win-win team.

The series has been first aired in 2011 and till now, 6 seasons have been broadcasted with 82 episodes.

Reasons to watch Suits

a) Aaron Korsh

He has been a spectacular writer, who has created the idea of Suits and characterised them with his own experience as an investment banker in Manhattan during the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. In fact, SUITS was originally set in the world of Wall Street, until USA redeveloped it, placing the original characters in the often rigid world of procedural law.

b) The mix of intelligence and law

Two totally opposite characters of the series, one who has in-depth knowledge of the law and other with a photographic memory, trying to deduce the case and bring justice to their clients. This shows the applicability of knowledge and reasoning. They both go hand in hand.

c) Cast

Suits have been nominated for several awards since 2012, with Gina Torres and Patrick J. Adams receiving individual praise for their roles as Jessica Pearson and Mike Ross respectively. Torres was nominated for Favorite TV Actress in a Supporting Role at the 2012 ALMA Awards and as Best Supporting Actress in Television at the 2013 Imagen Foundation Awards, while Adams was nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series at the 2012 Screen Actors Guild Awards.

d) Character of Harvey Specter

Suits props up the fantasy that if you “get your shit together”, “have goals instead of dreams” and “break the god damn wall down” when your back’s up against it, you can be Harvey Specter too.

e) Suit up right

The series has all influential character which appears realistic and gives an edge to the dressing sense while dealing in the corporate scenario. They dress in the most elegant way matching up with the style statement of the youth. Flawlessly tailored and have a classic cut, with peaked lapels and ticket pocket, modern look with skinny ties and thin lapels. The women in Suits are also dressed to the nines in high-waisted pencil skirts and beautiful jackets.

By Sanjukta Biswas, Staff Writer at Legal Desire Media & Publications

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The Indian legal profession today consists of approximately 12 lakhs registered advocates, around 950 law schools and approximately 4-5 lakhs law students across the country. Every year, approximately 60,000 – 70,000 law graduates join the legal profession in India. To become an eminent lawyer, one needs years of experience, dedication, rigorous study and track of the amendment laws and rules. All this helps an advocate to perform at his best in the court room and helps him interpret the law according to the nature of the case presented in front of them.

Here we would like to pen down topmost lawyers of India with reference to data of 2015 and 2016.

Harish Salve: Expertise in the areas of constitutional, commercial and taxation laws. He primarily practices at the India, but also appears in various High Courts and in international arbitral disputes, sometimes as a counsel and other times as an adjudicator. He served as the Solicitor General of India from 1 November 1999 to 3 November 2002. Land mark case:  Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Limited case of the Krishna Godavari Basin gas dispute case against the latter’s brother is the main Anil Ambani’s Reliance Natural Resources Limited.

Ram Jethmalani: Primarily known as only a criminal lawyer, although he has appeared in many important cases concerning constitutional matters.Ram Jethmalani first came to spot light with his appearance in the famous K. M. Nanavati vs. State of Maharashtra case in 1959 with Yeshwant Vishnu Chandrachud. And this case is about to show cased as Rustom realeasing on 12^th August, 2016.

Mukul Rohtagi: Works with various profiles of cases. Landmark case: Represented Gujarat government in the Supreme Court in the 2002 Gujarat riots and fake encounter death cases, including the Best Bakery and Zahira Sheikh Cases. He has also served earlier as Additional Solicitor General of India and presently appointed as Attorney General of India.

Majid Memon: Specialised in criminal law. Landmark case: He represented Yakub Memon but could not set him free.

Satish Maneshinde: Expertise in: Advocate FEMA, Custom Law Consultants, Service Matter Advocate, Will Legal Consultant, Labour Law Advocate, Online Dgft Licensing, Court Domicile Certificate, Excise, Civil, Factory, Consultant, Writ Advocate, Share Market Advocate. Landmark case: he secured bail for Sanjay Dutt in the Bombay Blast Case and for Salman Khan who allegedly killed one person for drunk driving.

Aryama Sundaram: Primarily practices corporate law but also takes up constitutional law and media related cases. Landmark Case:Lawyer in the S. Rangarajan case which resulted in one of the landmark judgments on the freedom of speech and expression.

Arvind Datar: He is a senior advocate of Madras High court who specializes in tax laws and a writer as well. His books ‘Nani Palkhivala: The Courtroom Genius’, ‘Datar Commentary on Constitution of India’ and ‘Guide to Central Excise Law and Practice: With Accounting Practices’. Landmark Case: High Court of Madras on the Sahara v. SEBI case (Sahara India Real Estate Corporation Limited v. Securities and Exchange Board of India).

Abhishek Manu Singhvi: Specialized in Constitutional law. Landmark case: Naveen Jindal vs M/S Zee Media Corporation Ltd & Anr.

Gopal Subramanium: Works with wide range of topics, from matters involving complex questions of constitutional and criminal law. Landmark case: concerning the law of arbitration in India, including the BALCO case.

Soli J. Sorabjee: Renowned human rights lawyer. He was appointed by the UN as a Special Rapporteur for Nigeria, in 1997, to report on the human rights situation in that country. Landmark cases: Keshavananda Bharati, Maneka Gandhi, S.R. Bommai. He has been honored with Padma Vibhushan for his defense of the freedom of expression and the protection of human rights.

Fali S. Nariman: Distinguished Indian Constitutional jurist and senior advocate to the Supreme Court of India since 1971. Landmark case: Nariman argued in favour of Dow chemicals (the owned by Union carbide) in the infamous Bhopal gas disaster case, which he admitted as a mistake in recent times. He has been awarded the Padma Bhushan (1991), Padma Vibhushan (2007) and Gruber Prize for Justice (2002).

By: Sanjukta Biswas, Staff Writer at Legal Desire Media & Publications

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