A Delhi court has dismissed a civil suit by a man seeking compensation from a lawyer for alleged misrepresentation, observing that dissatisfaction with legal strategy does not amount to a client’s mental harassment.
The judgment, delivered by senior civil judge Anuradha Jindal of the Saket Court on March 7, stated, “Legal representation inherently involves strategic decision-making, and an advocate’s approach may not always align with the expectations of a client. Such differences do not amount to harassment or mental agony in the legal sense.”
The court added that the complainant could have hired another lawyer instead of belatedly alleging harassment.
The ruling bolsters a 2021 Supreme Court observation noting a growing tendency of clients alleging negligence from lawyers in cases that don’t go in a client’s favour.
While refusing to condone a delay of 534 days in filing an appeal, the bench of the apex court, comprising Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice R Mahadevan, noted that a tendency was observed where clients blame the delay in a case on advocates, accusing them of negligence.
The bench stated that a client should equally be aware of judicial proceedings pending in the court and not solely accuse the advocate of being careless.
In 2024, a Supreme Court bench of Justices Bela M Trivedi and Pankaj Mithal, overturned an order passed by the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum in 2019, which held that services given by lawyers comes under the purview of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019.
In the instance matter, the case was filed by Shishir Chand, who sought ₹97,500 in damages and legal costs, alleging professional misconduct by lawyer TV George in handling a medical negligence case regarding his late brother. Chand’s brother had died of cardiac arrest in Jamshedpur in 2011 after allegedly being misdiagnosed at Tata Main Hospital.
Alleging inefficient treatment by the doctor, the complainant moved the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) in January 2013.
During the course of the proceedings, Chand apparently grew dissatisfied with George’s approach and discontinued his services in 2016, accusing him of mishandling the case and having a conflict of interest due to previous representation of Tata Steel.
The dispute centred on Chand’s insistence that George base his legal strategy on the doctor’s allegedly fake credentials, which George refused due to lack of conclusive proof.
On this aspect, the 68-page judgment noted that the decision this was a professional judgment call and could not be labelled negligence. “The decision to refrain from making such an allegation without conclusive proof was a professional judgement, which cannot retrospectively be labelled as negligence,” the court said.
It also dismissed Chand’s claims of conflict of interest, stating that there was no evidence to suggest George’s previous work with Tata Steel had compromised the case.
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