P&H HC Issues Notice On Plea Challenging Hindi Imposition In Haryana Courts

The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Monday issued notice on a writ petition filed by a group of advocates challenging the Haryana Official Language (Amendment) Act, 2020, which made Hindi the official language of civil and criminal courts in the State of Haryana.

Sameer Jain, appearing on behalf of the petitioners submitted that the Haryana Official Language (Amendment) Act, 2020 was violative of Section 30 of the Advocates Act, 1961, Article 14 and 19(1)(g) of the Constitution of India, 1950. Further, the Petitioners contended that the Amendment failed to create a classification based on any intelligible differentia and the restriction imposed on the right of English-speaking advocates & litigants was unreasonable and has no rational nexus with the object sought to be achieved by the Act. It was submitted that the objective of promulgating such notification is not clear and it has no rational nexus to object, if any, sought to be achieved. 

All law colleges teach in English medium and Hindi version of the legal terminologies may not be known to all lawyers, the petitioners pointed out.

A bench comprising Justices Rajan Gupta and Karamjit Singh issued notice to the Respondents, returnable on 29th June 2020, when the matter is next listed.

Sandeep Bajaj, Angad Sandhu, Suvigya Awasthy and Anant Gupta are the other petitioners in the case.

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