Legal Directions Newsletter June 2019

Newsletter on Indian and International Legal Affairs An initiative of RMN Foundation humanitarian organization VOL. II | ISSUE 6 | June 2019

Legal Directions Law Simplified

​How Chief Justice of India Failed to Give Justice to Woman Victim

An Editorial Initiative of Raman Media Network Editor: Rakesh Raman

Legal Trends | Opinions | Events | Law Education | Reforms

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

2

Main Stories in This Issue

Special Court

EU4Justice to Combat Crime and Corruption

Legal Cases

Learning

15th Annual ALB Japan Law Awards 2019 Should Congress Impeach Donald Trump?

News Analysis

20 Bitter Truths in the Indian Legal System

Sextortion Case of Chief Justice of India

Contempt Charge on Attorney General Barr

Legal Content Services for Law Firms Petition in a Corruption Case in Delhi

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

3

Trump Hides Mueller Report. Barr Charged with Contempt of Congress Attorney General William Barr, who is behaving as a personal attorney of Donald Trump, is helping Trump conceal the findings of the Mueller report.

The House Judiciary Committee held Attorney General William P. Barr in contempt of Congress on May 8 for his failure to turn over unredacted report of special counsel ​Robert Mueller on President Donald Trump’s secret links with Russia.

The Committee’s 24-to-16 contempt vote against Trump loyalist Barr came after President Trump asserted executive privilege to hide the full report along with the underlying evidence from Congress.

President Donald J. Trump participates in swearing-in of William P. Barr administered by U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts on February 14, 2019. Attorney General Barr’s wife, Christine, holds the Bible. Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour Trump has been claiming baselessly that the Mueller ​report has fully exonerated him from the

charges of collusion with Russia to win the 2016 presidential race deceptively and obstruction of justice to scuttle the Mueller investigation.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

4

Democrats, however, argue: If Trump feels he is exonerated, why is he trying to block the release of the report? Barr, who is behaving as a personal attorney of Trump, is helping Trump conceal the findings of the Mueller report.

The House Judiciary Committee has raised concerns over Barr’s characterization of Mueller report and even the special counsel himself had written a letter to Barr with his objections, saying Barr has not fully captured the context, nature, and substance of the report.

The Department of Justice headed by Barr has also decided to ignore the subpoena for the unredacted Mueller report and the underlying evidence that the Congress is demanding.

The Democrats are up in arms after the Department of Justice released Mueller’s partial report along with Barr’s misleading conclusion about the report.

House Speaker ​Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement

that Barr presented a conclusion that the president did not obstruct justice, but special counsel Mueller’s report cites several instances of presidential action that appear to undercut that finding.

After nearly two years of investigation, Mueller had delivered a 448-page ​report on March 20.

The report in two volumes – covering Russian interference including charges of conspiracy and the obstruction of justice – is so vague that it is difficult to make heads or tails of his random conclusions.

The vagueness of the report has given an opportunity to Trump to claim that there was no collusion with Russia and no obstruction of justice by him. Trump claims that the Mueller report has completely exonerated him.

Democrats, however, believe that Trump and Barr are lying, but the beleaguered Democrats are not able to get the full report and Barr has flatly ​refused to appear before the House Judiciary Committee.

In all probability this case will eventually get hushed up and Trump will win again in 2020 to retain his presidential position.

Meanwhile, an online ​petition on a dedicated “Need to Impeach” website claims that it has

collected more than 8 million signatures of Americans who want impeachment of President Trump.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

5

It also urges the petitioners to call House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to begin impeachment proceedings against Trump. The petition suggests that Trump has obstructed justice and special counsel Robert Mueller did not exonerate him in his report, which was supposed to investigate Trump’s secret links with Russia.

EU4Justice Project Gets € 2.2 Million to Combat Crime and Corruption The project is implemented in partnership with the GIP Justice International Cooperation (JCI) from France and aims at enhancing efficiency of investigation and prosecution.

Within the scope of the continuous EU support to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s the Rule of Law sector, the European Union officially launched on May 16 the new project ‘EU4Justice: Support to the Fight against Organized Crime and Corruption in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH)’ in the amount of EUR 2.2 million.

EU4Justice Project The project is implemented in partnership with the GIP Justice International Cooperation (JCI) from France and aims at enhancing efficiency of investigation and prosecution of serious corruption and organized crime cases through intensified cooperation along the criminal justice chain. This is a two-year project, which starts in 2019, and will last until January 2021.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

6

“Corruption and organized crime in Bosnia and Herzegovina is a big problem that needs to be tackled, and you do not really need the European Union to tell you so. This is a top priority for the European Union, not only in BiH but in the whole region,” underlined Mr. Khaldoun Sinno, Deputy Head of the Delegation of the European Union to BiH. Judiciary institutions throughout BiH will be involved in the implementation, including the High Judicial Prosecutorial Council, Prosecutors’ Offices, Courts, Ministries of Justice, and Law Enforcement Agencies.

The project aims to enhance the effectiveness, integrity, and professionalism of the institutions in the Rule of Law sector in BiH. It will help improve the cooperation between prosecution and law enforcement agencies to increase the efficiency of investigations in organized crime and corruption cases. It will also strengthen capacities regarding human resources and performance management as well as disciplinary frameworks and procedures.

The project will improve current practice and results in forfeiting criminal assets. In addition, it will implement tracking mechanism for improving mutual access to criminal case files by law enforcement agencies, prosecutors’ offices, and courts.

The GIP- JCI, an organization which is in charge of this project​, is the implementing body of the French Ministry of Justice. It enlists the expertise of the French legal community: judges, prosecutors, Law Enforcement Agencies, and the National Training School (ENM).

The Project Team will also resort to the French FIU (TRACFIN) the Agency for Seizure and Confiscation (AGRASC); and the National Financial Prosecution Service that deals with the most serious criminal investigations related to economic and financial offenses.

Download Previous Issues of Legal Directions

September 2018

October 2018

November 2018

December 2018

January 2019

February 2019

March 2019

April 2019

May 2019

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

7

Appeal for Donations RMN Foundation - the publisher of ​Legal

Directions newsletter - is a humanitarian organization that was formed in May 2015 as an educational and public charitable Trust for the benefit of humanity at large. It is registered with the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi at New Delhi, India.

Currently, all the activities of RMN Foundation are being managed single-handedly (without any support) by RMN Foundation founder Rakesh Raman who had left his job a few years ago to run this charity.

As RMN Foundation has embarked upon some major humanitarian projects during the past over 3 years, now it needs a significant amount of funds in the form of ​donations to expand the scope of its activities.

DONATION DETAILS Individual Indian donors can help RMN Foundation with their contributions using the following bank details: Bank Name: ICICI Bank Bank Branch: HL Square, Plot No. 6, Sector 5 (MLU), Dwarka, New Delhi 110 075 Account Number: 025005004368 Account Name: RMN Foundation Type of Account: Current IFSC Code: ICIC0000250 Or you can ​click here​ to donate with PayPal, credit card, or bank account.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

8

How Chief Justice of India Failed to Give Justice to Woman Victim Most observers believe that the so-called inquiry was a biased exercise to protect the Chief Justice and the committee did not follow the law to protect women from sexual harassment at their place of work.

The chattering classes in India are up in arms about the decision of a Supreme Court committee that has exonerated the Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi who has been blamed of sexual harassment by a former woman employee of the court.

The Justice S.A. Bobde committee, which gave a clean chit to the CJI on May 6, had Justices Indu Malhotra and Indira Banerjee as its members. The committee took ex-parte decision after the scared complainant withdrew from its proceedings on April 30.

Justice Ranjan Gogoi sworn in as the Chief Justice of Supreme Court of India (file photo).

Courtesy: Rashtrapati Bhavan

Meanwhile, India’s Attorney General (AG), K.K. Venugopal, said on May 10 that he had written to the Supreme Court judges about the constitution of an independent committee composed of retired judges. But his ​advice​ was ignored and an internal probe panel was formed.

As the internal committee was determined to protect Gogoi, it did not allow the woman complainant to appear with her lawyer or a support person. The woman also had requested the

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

9

inquiry committee to inform her about the procedure it will follow with the request that the proceedings be video-recorded.

But she complained that the probe panel held the hearing in an informal manner and asked her not to share the proceedings with her lawyer Vrinda Grover. As expected, the committee rejected her allegations against Gogoi and refused to share the report of its findings with her.

Most observers believe that the so-called inquiry was a biased exercise to protect the Chief Justice and the committee did not follow the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013, which is a legislative Act in India to protect women from sexual harassment at their place of work.

The former woman employee of the Supreme Court had leveled serious allegations of sextortion against Gogoi. In an affidavit that she sent to 22 judges of the court on April 19, 2019, the woman claimed that she is a victim of sexual harassment committed by Gogoi who made inappropriate advances toward her during October last year.

After holding an initial eyewash hearing to discuss his own case on April 20, Gogoi argued baselessly that the judiciary is being made a scapegoat and tried to brush the case under the carpet. Also, the Supreme Court Secretary General S. S. Kalgaonkar had rejected the woman's allegations without waiting for the inquiry committee’s decision.

15th Annual ALB Japan Law Awards 2019 The process will culminate in an awards ceremony on June 13, 2019 in Tokyo.

Asian Legal Business (ALB) will present the 15th Annual ALB Japan Law Awards 2019 to pay tribute to the outstanding performance of private practitioners and in-house teams in Japan and around the region.

Nominations to the awards are now open. You can submit details of your own law firm, in-house team, or other teams you have worked with in the past year to recognize their accomplishments and efforts.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

10

The process will culminate in an awards ceremony on June 13, 2019 in Tokyo. The ​event will welcome members of the bench, legal associations and business circles, law firms, and in-house departments.

20 Bitter Truths in the Indian Legal System Since Indian lawyers and judges are working in a casual, free-wheeling manner, the Indian legal system is plagued by random judgments and long delays.

By​ Rakesh Raman As a journalist and social activist, I run a free anti-corruption community court “​Clean House​” and publish ​Legal Directions​ newsletter​ to cover Indian and international legal affairs.

As part of my work, I keep interacting with dozens of lawyers, law officers, and law teachers. I also write frequently about global legal ​issues​. I have made the following observations after my first-hand experience with the Indian law fraternity during the past about 3 years. Here it goes:

1. While the administrative systems in India have almost collapsed, the ​bureaucrats do not take any decisions to resolve public problems. As a result, the suffering people have no other option

but to approach the courts. That’s why courts are always overcrowded and their decisions are either inordinately delayed or lack justice.

2. Most lawyers lack domain expertise and they are just providing template-based services to their clients. They pull out old court cases and change some sentences here and there to make legal documents for the clients. Such cases get defeated in the courts, but the lawyers take hefty fees from their clients while there is no accountability for them.

3. It is learnt that many so-called lawyers do not have proper law degrees to handle court cases.

However, it is almost impossible for the courts to check degrees of all the lawyers. Such fake lawyers masquerade as real lawyers and cheat their clients as well as the courts.

4. The English communication skills of most legal professionals are pathetic. While the petitions and judgments that they write are full of syntax and semantics errors, their convoluted sentences in legal documents are so ambiguous that they can be interpreted in many different ways. The law institutes fail to provide proper communication skills to students.

5. Most law students, teachers, and lawyers cannot even write emails and social media messages properly. When they write emails or social media posts, their language is wrong.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

11

6. While the government is trying to promote paperless digital courts​, the lawyers continue to work in an archaic way and can’t even use the basic email tool properly. Instead of reading the documents delivered over email, they force the clients to meet them frequently with bundles of paper files.

7. The digital courts are not functioning at all because India is one of the most backward nations in terms of​ technology​ adoption.

The President of India, Ram Nath Kovind, in a group photograph at the inauguration of the National Conference, organised by the Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association (SCAORA), in New Delhi on September 01, 2018. The Chief Justice of India, Justice Dipak Misra and other dignitaries are also seen in the photograph. (file photo) 8. The higher courts work on an ugly concept called “face value.” It is said that the judges see the face of the lawyer (instead of facts of the case) before they pronounce their judgments. That means if the lawyer is not known to the judge, the lawyer cannot expect the right judgment.

Therefore, most lawyers act as mere marketing agents of senior lawyers who have the “face value” to stand in front of a particular judge.

9. Instead of fully understanding the case, the Indian courts take hasty decisions to accept or dismiss the petitions. In the advanced parts of the world, the judges do their own research to understand the finer nuances of a case before pronouncing their judgments so that full justice is

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

12

delivered. They do not depend solely on the content written in the petitions and arguments in the courtrooms.

10. This type of research-based approach is urgently required in the Indian courts where lawyers and judges do not possess sufficient English language skills to write court documents and they lack domain expertise in the cases they handle.

11. Since Indian lawyers and judges are working in a casual, free-wheeling manner, the Indian legal system is plagued by random judgments and long delays. As a result, there is a backlog of 3.3 crore (33 million) cases in various courts of India. Of these, 2.84 crore (28.4 million) cases are in the subordinate courts, 43 lakh (4.3 million) are in the High Courts, and about 58,000 are in the Supreme Court.

12. The cases in which the judges are the accused are handled in a biased manner by holding superficial inquiries to protect the judges in an unscrupulous manner.

13. The judges even in the Supreme Court hesitate to open high-profile cases in which top politicians are involved. The​ judges​ are scared of the politicians.

14. There is hardly any law firm or lawyer who offers pro bono services to the deserving clients.

Some of them claim that they do pro bono work, but when you go to them, they either refuse to take your case or demand money. This is sheer dishonesty.

15. The government’s legal aid departments do not work. When you approach them as a needy client, they either treat you rudely as if you are a beggar or they harass you to such an extent that you stop pursuing your case.

16. It is said that many lawyers prefer to lose a case than to win it because they accept bribes from the parties against whom the case is filed.

17. While all important cases should be live-streamed to ensure transparency, the Indian courts prefer to hold court proceedings in an opaque manner, and sometimes media is also not allowed to cover the cases.

18. When justice systems across the world are getting revamped with the use of advanced technology including artificial intelligence (​AI​), expert systems, and virtual lawyers, the Indian courts and law institutes are still dependent on traditional, obsolete systems.

19. As law teachers are not eager to learn modern techniques of justice delivery system, they are not willing to change the old syllabuses and pedagogical methods. As a result, the law field is crowded with unskilled and unprofessional people.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

13

20. The arbitrariness in the Indian justice system is evident from the fact that senior Supreme Court judges have openly complained about it.

In the light of these facts, there is an urgent need to fix the accountability of lawyers as well as judges to protect the interests of the litigants. There is also a need to revamp the education system in law institutes with the aim to overhaul the entire legal ecosystem in the country.

You can​ ​click here to download​ the pdf version of this research paper.

Download and Read RMN Publications TechWise Today

The Integrity Bulletin

Clean Climate

Legal Directions

Young Learner

Real Voter

Legal Content Development Services for Law Firms Legal professionals and law firms are struggling to create engaging content that could help them expand their businesses and scope of services.

The need for quality content is more pronounced in today’s digitally driven business world where consumers are already facing an information overload from multiple data sources and a surfeit of frontend devices.

Consequently, legal professionals and law firms are struggling to create engaging content that could help them expand their businesses and scope of services.

In order to survive and thrive in the cut-throat legal business, law firms must work in collaboration with information domain experts who can create custom content for all their legal documentation and marketing needs.

You can ​click here to download​ and study a brief content creation proposal.

RMN Poll: Should Congress Impeach Donald Trump?

As RMN News Service has been extensively covering American politics and Trump-Russia affairs, it has launched a new RMN Poll to know people’s opinion on Trump’s impeachment.

After nearly two years of investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, special counsel ​Robert Mueller​ delivered a 448-page report on March 20.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

14

It is largely believed that Donald Trump had conspired with enemy nation ​Russia to win the

2016 presidential race deceptively, and later he committed “obstruction of justice” crime to scuttle the Mueller investigation.

President Donald Trump. Photo: White House The findings in the ​Mueller report have covered charges of conspiracy and the obstruction of justice. Although the report did not exonerate Trump, he has been making unsubstantiated claims that he did not collude with Russia and did not obstruct justice.

However, in his report, Mueller has suggested that Congress should take the final decision on Trump’s collusion with Russia as well as on the issue of obstruction of justice. But despite repeated requests by the House Judiciary Committee, Trump’s Attorney General ​William P. Barr has refused to share the full, unredacted report with the Congress.

Social Media Reactions​. You can read people’s comments and reactions about this article on social networking site Facebook. Click here for Facebook ​Group 1 and Facebook ​Group 2 to read the comments. You can also write your comments and share the article with others.

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

15

Now, the onus is on the Congress to discharge its constitutional duties and fix accountability if any crime has happened during or after the 2016 presidential election. But Trump has brazenly refused to cooperate with any investigation.

Although ​Trump’s impeachment seems to be the only way forward, Congress is reluctant to start impeachment proceedings.

As RMN News Service has been extensively covering American politics and Trump-Russia affairs, it has launched a new ​RMN Poll ​to know people’s opinion on Trump’s impeachment.

What is impeachment?

It is the process by which a legislative body such as the Congress levels charges against a government official including the President. Impeachment is not supposed to remove the official from office. Rather, it is only a process for indictment.

If the official is convicted after indictment, then only he or she can be removed from office.

Only those individuals can be impeached who commit crimes such as treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.

Petition in a Bureaucratic Corruption Case in Delhi The petition urges to start criminal proceedings against bureaucrats and others.

With the help of a ​petition addressed to the Director, Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Central Vigilance Commissioner (CVC), this case study highlights the enormity of corruption in

Delhi and urges India’s top anti-corruption departments to register an FIR (First Information Report) in this case for starting the inquiry.

The petition is filed under the Prevention of Corruption Act (PC Act) and other provisions of IPC with the prayer to start criminal proceedings against bureaucrats and others.

You can ​click here​ to study the case including the exhibits.

Meet the Editor

The editor of ​Legal Directions newsletter ​Rakesh Raman is a national award-winning

journalist and social activist. Besides working at senior editorial positions with leading media companies, he was writing an exclusive edit-page column regularly for The Financial Express (a daily business newspaper of The Indian Express Group).

Legal Directions: Newsletter on International Legal Affairs by RMN Foundation. June 2019

16

Nowadays, for the past about 8 years, he has been running his own global news services on different subjects. He also has formed a free Education and Career Counselling Center for deserving children at a poor J.J. Colony in Dwarka, New Delhi under his ​NGO – RMN Foundation.

He runs an exclusive community-driven anti-corruption social service “​Clean House​” to help the suffering residents of Delhi raise their voice against the growing corruption and injustice.

He also has formed an environment-protection group called​ Green Group​ in Delhi.

He creates and distributes a number of ​digital publications that cover areas such as technology, law, environment, education, politics, corruption and transparency. He has created an online information ​service​ to educate the Indian voters for the 2019 Lok Sabha election.

Earlier, he had been associated with the United Nations (UN) through United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) as a digital media expert to help businesses use technology for brand marketing and business development.

Collaboration with Legal Directions Project The ​Legal Directions newsletter is being published by RMN Foundation. It is being circulated among the top UN agencies, legal professionals, law colleges / universities, law-enforcement agencies, civil society organizations, social activists, and others in India and abroad.

RMN Foundation is looking for sponsors and collaborators across the world who can help us expand the legal content activity around ​Legal Directions​.

Contact

Rakesh Raman Founder RMN Foundation

463, DPS Apts., Plot No. 16, Sector 4, Dwarka, Phase I New Delhi 110 078, INDIA

Contact by email