Joint Action Plan of Legal Aid Society in association with CRY (Child Rights and You)

On September 22, 2011, Ms. Leena Prasad from CRY (Child Rights and You), along with two volunteers, Anushree and Richa, who are also members of CLC Legal Aid Society, came down to Faculty of Law and had a discussion with Dr. Raman Mittal, regarding joint effort of Legal Aid Society and CRY, for promotion of Child rights and on conduction of a workshop on Right to Education.

Main issues of discussion were the rights of Children in custody and the code of conduct for Lawyers dealing in the matters of juvenile. As per Ms. Leena Prasad, there is a code of conduct for lawyers appearing in juvenile matters in America. There is a need to propose and act for implementation of a code of conduct for legal professionals dealing with Juvenile matters. Most of the counsel for Juvenile are not very well versed with "Best interest principle", as the interpretation of the principle is still ambiguous. There is a need of implementation of rules and regulation for juvenile matters to protect the rights of child.  CRY has already prepared a Draft on code of conduct for lawyers dealing with child rights matters. There is a bill on the website of Ministry of Law and Justice, 'Legal Practitioners (Regulations and Maintenance of Standards in Professions, Protecting the Interest of Clients and Promoting the Rule of Law) Bill, 2010, in which there is no special provisions for lawyers dealing with juvenile matter, a need for joint effort was felt.

First course of action in the joint effort plan is the orientation program of CRY, which is going to be held on September 29, 2011. We are also planning a workshop on Right to Education in October by Legal Aid Society in collaboration with CRY.