TWO lawyers are taking the Law Society to court over its refusal
to backdate their practising certificates.
Mr Sadique Marican and Mr Anand Kumar say they submitted
e-applications to renew their practising certificates, a yearly
ritual required by law, on April 30, but were issued the renewed
papers only on May 18.
The 18-day delay was not their fault, claim the pair, who now
want a High Court to restore the April 30 date. The reasons for
their insistence on the backdating are expected to emerge when the
case goes to trial.
The entire month of April is actually the grace period for
renewal applications, as all certificates expire on March 31.
Certificates renewed any time up to the last day of April are
considered as having been valid from April 1.
So if the two lawyers' certificates were issued only on May 18,
they would effectively have been unable to take on new cases or
work on existing ones between April 1 and May 17, the period they
were unlicensed.
A lawyer who practises without a valid certificate puts both his
clients and himself at risk, as he would be unable to enforce pacts
with his clients for his services; he would also not be covered by
professional indemnity insurance.
Mr Marican and Mr Kumar have engaged Senior Counsel Tan Cheng
Han and the TSMP Law Corporation for the case. A pre-trial
conference was held earlier this week.
Court documents indicated that they filed online applications
for renewal together with a colleague from the same firm on April
30. That colleague was the only one among them who was issued a
renewed certificate dated April 30.
Their submissions were apparently blocked and their e-filing
rejected by the system.
At issue is whether the Law Society intended to upload into the
system additional data linked to their applications, which missed
the April 30 deadline. The Law Society is expected to submit its
case in due course; a further pre-trial hearing is due in a
fortnight.
--ST