‘My Lord’ or ‘your lordship’ No More in P & H HC

No more ‘My Lord’ in Punjab & Haryana HC
Chandigarh: The Punjab & Haryana High Court Bar Association on Thursday passed a resolution asking its members not to address judges as ‘My Lord’ or ‘your lordship’. With this, it has become the second high court in the country after Kerala HC advocates association passed such a resolution in June 2007.
In the resolution passed unanimously by the 4,500-member strong lawyers association, it was decided that in future, the judges should be addressed as ‘sir’ or ‘your honour’. The decision was taken in the general house meeting of the bar. President of the bar association Kulbir Singh Dhaliwal said: “We passed the resolution to endorse the already existing rules framed by the Bar Council of India (BCI) in 2006, that had resolved that the form of address in the Supreme Court and high courts should be ‘your honour’ or ‘honourable court’.” He said because of habit, some lawyers may continue with the old style, but gradually they will get used to the new language. “The bar has received positive response from the judges,” he said.
The BCI, the apex body of lawyers in the country, had adopted a resolution in April 2006 and added a new rule 49(1) (j) in the Advocates Act. According to the rule, lawyers can address the court as `your honour' and refer to it as `honourable court'. If it is a subordinate court, lawyers can use terms such as `sir' or any equivalent phrase in the regional language.