Prayagraj: The Allahabad High Court has directed that any act of an individual lawyer of the state or their association to go on strike, to give a call for strike or even to abstain from work on account of condolence due to the death of a lawyer/officer/employee of the court or their relatives would be treated as an ex-facie act of criminal contempt . The court, however, clarified that lawyers or their associations may call any condolence meeting only after 3:30 pm. A division bench, comprising Justice Ashwani Kumar Mishra and Justice Dr Gautam Chowdhary, directed all the district judges across the state to report any act of strike by the lawyers in their respective courts to the registrar-general of Allahabad High Court along with the name of office-bearers of the respective bar association, which has given a call for strike or the name of lawyers who call such strike so that appropriate proceedings of criminal contempt are instituted against them following the law.
The court further directed that these directions be circulated to all district courts and displayed on the notice boards of all courts throughout the state to ensure strict compliance. The court issued these directions while dealing with a suo moto criminal contempt matter, wherein cognizance was taken on a report received from district judge, Prayagraj, indicating that between July 2023 and April 2024, the lawyers in district court abstained from work or resorted to strike on 127 days out of a total of 218 days..