Supreme Court: In an application assailing non-compliance with the order dated 13 March 2026, pan-India 30 per cent women representation in Bar Associations mandate in Deeksha Amrutesh v. State of Karnataka, 2026 SCC OnLine SC 472, the three-Judge Bench of Surya Kant CJI, Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M. Pancholi, JJ., said,
“We also deem it necessary to issue a word of caution and a stern warning that wherever the Bar Associations have failed to comply with, or shall be found to have defied, the directions issued hereinabove, such Bar Associations shall be liable to be suspended through a judicial order and fresh elections shall be directed to be conducted.”
The Court further changed the nominating authority in cases where women members do not contest or where there is a shortfall in representation.
The application was filed in a batch of matters related to ensuring 30 per cent representation of women advocates as Office Bearers or Executive Members in every Bar Association, including at taluka or district levels and specialised bodies like tax and RERA, as well as High Court Bar Associations.
The Court, by its order dated 24 March 2025, mandated that there shall be 30 per cent representation of women lawyers as Office Bearers/Executive Members in the District/Taluka or any other type of Bar Associations. The Court had issued directions to the Registrar Generals of all the High Courts to ensure such representations in all the Bar Associations. However, it was brought to our notice that in some States, the benefit of representation for women members was not percolating at different types of Bar Associations, such as Tax, RERA, NGT, DRT, as well as at the sub-divisional level. Thus, on 16 January 2026, the Court sought a status report from the Registrar Generals of all the High Courts with a commitment to ensure adequate representation from all the Bar Associations.
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On 13.03.2026, the Court noted that only 13 out of 25 High Courts submitted their compliance reports. The Court accordingly directed the remaining High Courts to ensure compliance of 30% women reservation rule across the Bar Associations in their respective jurisdictions, and submit a report within two weeks. The Court further directed that where,
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number of women lawyers enrolled with such Bar Associations falls significantly short of 30%; those available may serve on their governing body.
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there are enough women members and, for some reason, they could not contest the election, the District Judges are hereby authorised to nominate women members to the executive committee of the respective Bar Associations within their jurisdiction.
On 17 April 2026, further time was sought to collate the information received from the different High Courts, as certain Bar Associations had not complied with the directions contained in the order dated 13 March 2026.
Hence, the Court deemed it necessary to issue a word of caution and a stern warning to the Bar Associations that failed to comply with, or defied, the directions issued. The Court stated that such defaulter Bar Associations shall be liable to be suspended through a judicial order, and fresh elections shall be directed to be conducted.
The Court reiterated that the purpose and object of the order dated 13 March 2026 is to ensure that 30% of the posts of the governing or executive members in every Bar Association, on a pan-India basis, shall be for the purpose of ensuring adequate representation of women advocates.
The Court modified its previous direction pertaining to the nominations of women members in cases where enough women advocate members are not present and/or do not contest the elections. The Court directed that such nomination shall now be made by the Administrative Judge/Portfolio Judge of the jurisdictional High Court, in consultation with the concerned District and Sessions Judge, the elected office bearers, and the senior-most women members of the respective District Bar Association. The Court further clarified that the tenure of the nominated member shall be co-terminus with that of the elected members.
[Deeksha Amrutesh v. State of Karnataka, Petition(s) for Special Leave to Appeal (C) No(s).1404/2025, ordered on 16-4-2026]
Advocates who appeared in this case:
For the petitioner: Sr. Adv. Nalina Mayegowda, AOR Sujoy Chatterjee with Saloni Narayan, B.S. Gayathri, Priyadarshi Banerjee, Rishabh Singhle, Dilraj Singh Bhinder, Advocates;
Sr. Adv. Jayna Kothari, Sr. Adv. Anindita Pujari, AOR Hitendra Nath Rath with Shaileshwar Yadav, Aparna Mehotra, Radhika Mohapatra, Laxmi, Advocates;
Sr. Adv. Lakshmy Iyengar with AOR Divya Swami, Amruthesh N.P., Harshith S., Tanmay Mehta, Advocates
For the respondent: Aman Panwar (AAG), AOR Sanchit Garga with Kunal Rana, Shashwat Jaiswal, Abhinav Kumar, Manav Kaushik, Advocates;
AOR H. Chandra Sekhar with Kunal Rana, Shashwat Jaiswal, Abhinav Kumar, Manav Kaushik, Advocates;
AOR M/s Krishna & Nishani Law Chambers with Anil C Nishani, J K Mishra, Krishna M Singh, Kushal U, Advocates;
AOR K. V. Bharathi Upadhyaya with Pritama, Shaivani Gupta, Sunita, Sufyan Hasan, Hema, Bipin Vinayak Chandan, Gousali K R, Advocates;
AOR Deepika Nandakumar with Kanimozhi J., Advocate;
AOR B. Shravanth Shanker with Prerna Robin, Grahita Agarwal, B. Yeshwanth Raj, Advocates;
AOR Ranu Purohit with Yashas Rk, Niharika Singh, Advocates;
AOR Kumar Mihir with Ahanthem Henry, Ahanthem Rohen Singh, Mohan Singh, Aniket Rajput, Khios Am Nirmala Devi, Yeshu Mehta, Tanay Hegde, Advocates;
AOR Agam Sharma;
AOR Sanjai Kumar Pathak with Shashi Pathak, Arvind Kumar Tripathi, Robin Kumar, Shweta Jayshankar Dwivedi, Ashish Kumar Sinha, Binita Jaiswal, Advocates;
AOR K. V. Muthu Kumar with S Selvakumari, Shreemoyee Bhattacharjee, Advocates;
AOR Nidhi Mittal;
AOR Anu B. with Vaibhav Choudhary, Bibhuti Krishna, Motisham Ali, Advocates;
AOR Avneesh Arputham with Ankit Sharma, Advocate;
AOR Ashok Bannidinni with Thyagaraj, Gnanesh H Kempanna, Sunil M.V, Betsara Mylliemngap, Advocates;
AOR Amit Sharma with Dipesh Sinha, Pallavi Barua, Aparna Singh, Advocates;
AOR Nishant Ramakantrao Katneshwarkar with Vijay Singh Mehra, Shrirang Katneshwarkar, Dipak Vidhate, Advocates;
AOR Shiwani Tushir;
AOR Divyakant Lahoti with Kartik Lahoti, Akanksha Soni, Shubheksha Dwivedi, Vindhya Mehra, Praveena Bisht, Rahul Maheshwari, K Vinayakam Gupta, Samridhi Bhatt, Siddharth Tripathi, Shreya Gokel, Advocates;
AOR Charu Mathur with Charu Mathur, Advocate;
AOR Anuj Bhandari with Anuj Bhandari, Jahanvi Bhardwaj, Ishu Bhardwaj, Advocates;
AOR S. Vinay Ratnakar with Divya Dokka, Aishwarya Sudhir, Advocates;
AOR P. I. Jose with P S Chandralekha, Advocate;
AOR Yash S. Vijay with Shikhar Aggarwal, Joshua Tom Thomas,
AOR D. Mahesh Babu with Shishir Pinaki, Dhanaeswar Gudapalli, Satyeyu Veer, Bamandla Venkatesh, Advocates;
AOR Disha Singh;
AOR Sandeep Sudhakar Deshmukh with Nishant Sharma, Ankur Savadikar, Kartik Sharma, Advocates;
Sr. Adv. Guru Krishna Kumar with AOR Radhika Gautam