Only 27,000 of about 81,000 Kerala lawyers hold CoPs
More than 22,000 lawyers in Kerala still haven't completed the mandatory law degree verification needed for a Certificate of Practice (CoP).
Out of about 81,000 registered lawyers with the Bar Council of Kerala, only 27,000 have actually received their CoPs so far, which means a lot of legal professionals could soon face restrictions.
Kerala lawyers face AI filing blocks
The verification process was started to weed out fake practitioners and keep Bar Council elections fair.
But delays are piling up: around 20,000 certificates of another 20,000 lawyers, who cleared the All India Bar Examination since 2010, have been forwarded for verification, plus another 5,000 older applications are waiting on universities.
Without a CoP, these lawyers won't be able to file petitions online, especially as new AI systems will start blocking unverified filings.
The future course of action will have to be decided by the upcoming council.
As K.N. Anilkumar put it, many unverified names might just belong to people who've retired or moved on.