Admission and enrolment of advocates

Professional Ethics · Unit I · Topic 5 of 18 · 6 min read

Who may be enrolled under section 24, the disqualifications in section 24A, the procedure before the enrolment committee, the enrolment fee after Gaurav Kumar, the All India Bar Examination, and the sleeping-partner problem solved.

← All Professional Ethics topics Past papers

On this page

1. Qualifications: section 24(1)
2. Disqualifications: section 24A
3. Procedure
4. The power to add conditions, and its limits
5. Problem
How this is examined

Cases checked to exist. Read the judgment before quoting a holding.

Every case cited here has been checked to exist — the citation resolves and names the right parties. The propositions attributed to each case have not been verified line by line against the judgment. Case names link through to the full judgment: read it before quoting a holding in an examination answer, and never carry a proposition from notes into court on trust.

The examinable core. Sections 24 (qualifications), 24A (disqualifications), 25 to 27 (procedure) and the Bar Council of India Rules on employment (Rules 47 to 52). The examiner wants the conditions in a list, the procedure in sequence, and the cases that tested the Bar Councils’ power to add conditions: an age bar struck down, an examination upheld, extra fees struck down.

1. Qualifications: section 24(1)

Subject to the Act and the rules, a person is qualified to be admitted as an advocate on a State roll if:

(a) he is a citizen of India. A foreign national may be admitted if Indian citizens, duly qualified, are permitted to practise in his country (reciprocity; see also section 47);
(b) he has completed 21 years of age;
(c) he has obtained a degree in law from a university recognised by the Bar Council of India (after 12 March 1967, after a three-year course, or the integrated course), or a recognised foreign degree;
(e) he fulfils such other conditions as may be specified in the rules made by the State Bar Council under Chapter III; and
(f) he has paid the stamp duty, if any, and the enrolment fee: six hundred rupees to the State Bar Council and one hundred and fifty rupees to the Bar Council of India (one hundred and twenty-five rupees in all for members of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes).

Clause (d), which required training or an examination, was omitted in 1973.

2. Disqualifications: section 24A

No person shall be admitted as an advocate if:

he is convicted of an offence involving moral turpitude;
he is convicted of an offence under the Untouchability (Offences) Act, 1955 (now the Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955); or
he is dismissed or removed from employment or office under the State (within the meaning of Article 12) on a charge involving moral turpitude.

The disqualification ceases two years after release, dismissal or removal. It does not apply to a person dealt with under the Probation of Offenders Act, 1958.

3. Procedure

Section 25. Application in the prescribed form to the State Bar Council within whose jurisdiction the applicant proposes to practise.
Section 26(1). The State Bar Council refers it to its enrolment committee, which disposes of it.
Section 26(2) and (3). If the committee proposes to refuse, it must refer the application, with its grounds, to the Bar Council of India for opinion, and must dispose of it in conformity with that opinion.
Section 26(4). A refusal is intimated to all other State Bar Councils.
Proviso to section 26(1). The Bar Council of India may remove a name entered by misrepresentation, fraud or undue influence, after a hearing.
Section 27. A person refused by one State Bar Council cannot apply to another without the written consent of the refusing Council and the Bar Council of India.
Section 22. On admission, a certificate of enrolment is issued.
Section 17(4). No person may be on the roll of more than one State Bar Council; section 18 provides for transfer through the Bar Council of India.

4. The power to add conditions, and its limits

Age bar struck down. In Indian Council of Legal Aid and Advice v. Bar Council of India, 1995 INSC 41, (1995) 1 SCC 732, a rule of the Bar Council of India barring enrolment of persons who had completed 45 years was held ultra vires the Act and discriminatory under Article 14.
Examination upheld. In Bar Council of India v. Bonnie Foi Law College, 2023 INSC 116, a Constitution Bench held that the Bar Council of India may prescribe a pre-enrolment or post-enrolment examination under section 49 read with section 24(3)(d). The All India Bar Examination is therefore valid, and the contrary view in V. Sudeer v. Bar Council of India (1999) no longer stands.
Extra fees struck down. In Gaurav Kumar v. Union of India, 2024 INSC 558, the Court held that State Bar Councils cannot charge, as a condition of enrolment, any fee beyond what section 24(1)(f) prescribes. The decision operates prospectively.
Other professions. In Dr. Haniraj L. Chulani v. Bar Council of Maharashtra and Goa, 1996 INSC 491, (1996) 3 SCC 342, a rule refusing enrolment to a person who carries on another profession (a practising doctor) unless he gives it up was upheld: law demands a full-time commitment.
Full-time employment. A full-time salaried employee cannot be enrolled while so employed (Rule 49): Satish Kumar Sharma v. Bar Council of Himachal Pradesh, 2001 INSC 2, (2001) 2 SCC 365.

5. Problem

Mr. X is a sleeping partner in a partnership firm. He applies to be enrolled as an advocate. The State Bar Council rejects the application. Is the Council justified?

Issue. Whether being a sleeping partner in a business is a ground for refusing enrolment.

Law. Section 24 lists the qualifications, and section 24A the disqualifications; neither mentions partnership in a business. Rule 47 of Part VI, Chapter II of the Bar Council of India Rules says an advocate “shall not personally engage in any business; but he may be a sleeping partner in a firm doing business provided that in the opinion of the appropriate State Bar Council, the nature of the business is not inconsistent with the dignity of the profession.” Under section 26(2) an enrolment committee that proposes to refuse must refer the matter to the Bar Council of India.

Application. A sleeping partner contributes capital and shares profit but takes no part in running the business. That is what Rule 47 allows. The only question the State Bar Council may ask is whether the nature of the business is consistent with the dignity of the profession: a partnership in a textile shop would be; one in a liquor bar or a money-lending concern that sues debtors may not be. If X fulfils section 24 and is not disqualified under section 24A, the bare fact of being a sleeping partner is not a ground for refusal. If the Council refused without referring the matter to the Bar Council of India, the refusal is also bad for non-compliance with section 26(2). Contrast the position if X were an active or managing partner, which Rule 47 forbids, or a full-time employee of the firm, which Rule 49 forbids.

Conclusion. The rejection is not justified unless the Council finds, on reasons, that the business itself is inconsistent with the dignity of the profession, and the procedure in section 26(2) is followed. X may seek reconsideration or approach the High Court under Article 226.

How this is examined

“Explain the admission and enrolment of advocates” (December 2017) and “provisions relating to admission and enrolment” (June 2017) are answered from sections 24, 24A, 25 to 28 and 17 to 22, with the four cases in section 4 above. The sleeping-partner problem was set in June 2018. Always mention the reference to the Bar Council of India under section 26(2); it is the step most answers forget.

Now try the real questions: Professional Ethics past question papers.