NEW DELHI: Terming the current structure of the legal profession as “feudal” and “patriarchal”, CJI DY Chandrachud on Saturday batted for laying blocks of future by creating access to women within the legal profession. CJI Chandrachud was speaking at the HT Leadership Summit in New Delhi.
“Judiciary has a feeding pool and for the Supreme Court, it is high court & lawyers from the bar. For HC, the feeding pool is the district judiciary or the lawyers who practice before the SC. What has happened therefore is that the feeding pool which determines who enters our judiciary is largely dependent on the structure of the legal profession. Structure of the legal profession today is feudal, patriarchal and has not been accommodating women. So when we talk of the need to have women in the judiciary, it’s necessary for us to lay the building blocks of the future by creating access to women now within the legal profession. Entering chambers of a senior counsel, it looks like an old boys club. How do you gain access to chambers? You gain access to chambers by tapping your connections. Until we have a democratised and merit-based access to entry point in the legal profession, we will not have women or people belonging to marginalised groups entering the profession,” he said.
He also said that to tackle the huge backlog of cases, the need of the hour was to fill up the existing vacancies in courts.