HC caps fee for filing complaint against misconduct by lawyer at Rs 1,750

Dehradun: The high court (HC) bench of Chief Justice Vipin Sanghi and Justice Alok Verma has mandated the Bar Council of Uttarakhand to adhere to the prescribed fee of Rs 1,750 for lodging a complaint against a lawyer for professional misconduct, as stipulated by the Bar Council of India.
In a previous instance, the Uttarakhand Bar Council had levied a fee of Rs 5,500 from 20 individuals for such cases.The petitioner, Satyadev Tyagi, a retired educator from Meerut, asserted that the council had escalated the fee for registering a misconduct complaint against a lawyer, contravening the regulations of the Bar Council of India.
The HC affirmed that the Uttarakhand Bar Council cannot impose a fee higher than the amount prescribed by the Bar Council of India. Furthermore, the court directed that in the 20 cases where the council had already collected Rs 5,500 as complaint fees, the excess amount should be refunded expeditiously.