Narmadapuram (Madhya Pradesh): The scene was the district court premises. A middle-aged woman walked up to the office of the District Legal Service Authority (DLSA) a few months ago.

She had a dispute with her husband over maintenance allowance, but she was unable to fight the case, since she had no money to enter a legal battle against her husband. Nevertheless, when the woman Ramabai appealed to the DLSA office, a band of lawyers came to her rescue.

The defence counsel team fought her case free of cost, and advised Rama Bai and her husband to sign an agreement. Afterwards, her husband gave her Rs 4,000 a month as maintenance allowance.

Now, she is happy. In another case, the DLSA got a man, Patiram, charged with stealing Sagon logs 18 years ago, freed from jail. This is how DLSA is working for the poor. 

According to reports, DLSA will provide lawyers free of cost to the poor to fight their cases. Besides, they do not have to pay any fees for bail under the Legal and Defence Counsellor Scheme. To get the legal aid, one has to apply to the office of the DLSA on the district court premises.

More than 70 people have been given benefits under the scheme.  The panel comprises defence lawyer Satish Tiwar, deputy chief defence lawyer Anant Tiwari, Pankaj Tiwari, Mangal Singh Parihar and others.

According to Section 23 of the Constitution, people harassed for no reason, a victim of caste-related violence, earthquake, floods, drought and struck by poverty are eligible for free legal aid.

Besides industrial workers, and those who are in police custody and those whose income is less than Rs 2 lakh a year are included in the scheme.

Lawyers’ functioning monitored

President of the District Legal Services Authority (DLSA) Satish Chandra Sharma and its secretary Kailash Bhatt said that keeping in mind the aim of the Constitution Legal and Defence Counsellor system has been launched from February this year. The higher authorities are monitoring the functioning of the lawyers of Defence Counselling, they said.