Choosing a criminal lawyer in Ghaziabad: questions to ask and red flags

Ask first

Which court is my case in, who will appear on each date, what is the next step, and what is the fee in writing.

Leave if you hear

A guaranteed result, a "setting" with the judge or police, or a demand for cash with no receipt.

Verify

Bar Council of Uttar Pradesh enrolment, and the eCourts record of a case the advocate names.

Chamber

Chamber 817, District Court Complex, Raj Nagar District Centre (RDC), Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh 201002. Monday to Saturday, 9 am to 9 pm.

A criminal case is usually the first time a family has to choose a lawyer, and the choice is made in a hurry, after an arrest or a notice, with little to go on beyond a name someone passed on. The Bar Council of India's rules stop advocates from advertising or claiming results, which is right, but it leaves clients with no way to compare. What follows is the set of questions the chamber would want a client to ask of any advocate, including this one, and the answers that should and should not come back. The criminal cases page describes the work itself; this page is about choosing who does it.

Which court is my case in, and do you appear there?

A Ghaziabad FIR goes to a Magistrate at RDC and, for grave offences, to a Sessions court in the same complex; a bail rejection goes to the Allahabad High Court. Ask the advocate which court your case is in now and which court it goes to next. A criminal advocate who practises at RDC will answer without looking anything up, and will know the ACJM courts by number. An advocate whose practice is somewhere else, or in a different branch of law, will give a general answer. There is nothing wrong with a lawyer from Delhi or Noida, but the trial will be heard in Ghaziabad on dates fixed by a Ghaziabad court, and a lawyer who is not there on those dates costs you adjournments.

Who will actually appear on my dates?

This is the question most clients forget. The advocate you meet may not be the advocate who stands up in court. Large practices send a junior; some send a clerk to take a date. Ask directly: on a routine date, who appears; on the day a witness is cross-examined, who appears; if you are in the High Court, who argues. The honest answer in a busy practice is that a junior handles some dates and the senior handles the contested ones, and that is fine if it is said in advance. The answer to worry about is the one that avoids the question.

What is the next step, and what do you need from me?

A criminal case is a chain of stages, and a competent advocate can tell you from the FIR alone what the next one is: a notice under Section 35(3) BNSS to be answered, an anticipatory bail application under Section 482 BNSS, a regular bail application under Section 480 or 483 BNSS, a charge hearing, a cross-examination. Ask what the next step is, what document it needs, and when it will be filed. The answer should name a court, a filing and a date. If the answer is only reassurance, you have not yet met your lawyer.

The same question tells you whether the advocate has read the papers. One who asks for the FIR, the arrest memo and the remand order before giving a view is doing the job; one who gives a view without them is guessing. The documents checklist shows what a first meeting on a criminal case needs.

What is the fee, and what does it cover?

Ask for the fee before the work begins and ask for it in writing: what it covers, what stage it runs to, what is extra. Fees in criminal practice are usually fixed by stage, so that a bail application, a trial and an appeal are separate engagements. Clerkage, typing and court fee are small, but they should be shown as what they are. An advocate who is vague about the fee at the start will be vague about it later, and the cases where a family pays twice for the same stage almost all begin with nothing written down.

Two things that are not fees. Money for "the judge", "the police" or "the file to move" is not a fee and not legal; an advocate who asks for it is not acting as one. And money handed over in cash without a receipt is money you cannot account for when the case, or the relationship, goes wrong.

The red flags

• A guaranteed result. "Bail is certain", "the case will be dismissed", "I have never lost a 498A case". No one controls a judge's decision, and the Bar Council forbids advertising results precisely because such claims cannot be true. An advocate who makes them is selling, not advising.
• "Setting" talk. Any suggestion that the advocate has an arrangement with the judge, the prosecutor or the investigating officer. It is false, and if it were true it would be a crime. Leave.
• Touts at the gate. The people who stop families outside the RDC complex, at the police station or at the jail gate and offer a lawyer, a surety or a fast bail. They are paid a commission from your fee, and the advocate chosen for you is chosen for that commission.
• No file, no copies. You should be given a copy of every application filed and every order passed, and should be able to see the case on the eCourts website under your name. An advocate who keeps the file out of sight is keeping something else out of sight.
• Every case is urgent, every stage needs more money. Some stages are urgent. Not all of them are, and an advocate who creates a crisis before each payment is managing you rather than the case.
• Contempt for the other side's lawyer or the court. The advocate who runs down every judge and every opposing counsel will, in time, run down you.

How to verify what you are told

Every advocate in Uttar Pradesh is enrolled with the Bar Council of Uttar Pradesh and has an enrolment number; ask for it, together with the name on the roll. Any case the advocate mentions as being in a Ghaziabad court can be looked up on the eCourts case status service, which shows the advocate on record. A visit to the chamber tells you more than a website: whether it is in the court complex, whether it is open in court hours, and whether the advocate you spoke to is the one sitting there. The page on choosing a lawyer in Ghaziabad covers the Bar Council rules on what an advocate may and may not do, and the first-meeting guide lists the questions for any kind of case.

What a good answer sounds like

The advocate reads the FIR before speaking. The advocate names the court, the section, the next application and the date it can be filed. The advocate says what cannot be promised. The advocate states the fee and writes it down. The advocate tells you who will appear and when they will not. The advocate gives you a copy of what is filed. None of that is remarkable; it is what the work looks like when it is done properly, and it is the standard the criminal cases page describes for this chamber.

Read next

• How a criminal trial runs in the Ghaziabad District Court: from charge to judgment
• Police calling you for a matrimonial dispute in Ghaziabad: what to do before the FIR
• Anticipatory bail under Section 482 BNSS in the Ghaziabad Sessions Court

Questions people ask