The Trial & Appellate Advocacy Society (TAAS) of KIIT Law School (KLS) organized a webinar on “Practical Challenges of Trial Advocacy” on 30th January 2022. The webinar aimed at informing students of the practical challenges of advocacy and enhancing their skills according to contemporary times, practicality and necessity.
Mr. Manav Gecil Thomas was the guest speaker of the session. He has a long-standing career in the field of litigation and has handled litigations in varied forums including the Supreme Court of India, High Courts of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, District Courts, and other statutory tribunal and quasi forms. He has argued cases in a range of legal fields such as civil, criminal, family, land, commercial, corporate, consumer, labor, administration, banking, and personal & business law. After completing law degree, he joined Thomas George Associates under the mentorship of his father Mr. Thomas George. During the Covid time, he has been organizing virtual moot courts and has initiated a virtual internship program to help the interns in gaining experience and opportunities. Around 200+ interns were mentored by him.
Putting across his ideas and experience as a trial lawyer and mediator, Mr. Manav detailed the basic challenges one faces in trial advocacy. He talked about the importance of researching every case one needs to prepare and also the importance of stamps, which while filling any case need to be present in the case file, especially the welfare stamp. The pandemic has made one of the toughest tasks easier – the filling of cases, he said, elaborating that earlier only some courts worked on e-filing, but now every court across India has begun with the e-filing process. He went on to talk about the challenges in trial advocacy like Archaic Procedure (the summon and its service), too many procedures, ignorance of the law, client truth before the appearance in court, and adjournments. He emphasized one should get oneself updated with the rules, amendments, and case laws as it will make the case better and stronger while appearing in the court. The talk was followed by a Q&A session.
The session ended with a vote of thanks by Mr. Sarvesh Shahi, Faculty Coordinator and the Student Convenor. More than 125 students participated in the webinar, which provided a great platform for motivation and the art of advocacy.