<p>The Supreme Court on Tuesday said it would decide about restarting physical courts after consulting medical experts while maintaining that the present advice was against it.</p>.<p>“We have been facing close down of courts for nearly a year. Present medical advice is that open court hearing would spread Covid," a bench presided over by Chief Justice S A Bobde said.</p>.<p>The bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian said the Madras, Rajasthan, Delhi HCs began physical hearings, but closed down as lawyers didn't appear.</p>.<p>Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said one must remember that even during a pandemic, the court didn't deny access to justice. Since March 2020, the top court has been conducting hearings through video conferencing. It also passed a judicial order allowing the High Courts and district courts to conduct online hearings.</p>.<p>Hearing a batch of petitions for financial aids to lawyers, the court asked Mehta to convene a meeting to discuss the proposal of Bar associations for the Centre to arrange a sum of Rs three lakhs to struggling lawyers, with Bar councils and associations standing as guarantors.</p>.<p>"The Bar is primarily responsible to help lawyers, governments have a secondary role," the bench said.</p>.<p>The Bar Council of India, for its part, said its resources were completely drained.</p>
<p>The Supreme Court on Tuesday said it would decide about restarting physical courts after consulting medical experts while maintaining that the present advice was against it.</p>.<p>“We have been facing close down of courts for nearly a year. Present medical advice is that open court hearing would spread Covid," a bench presided over by Chief Justice S A Bobde said.</p>.<p>The bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian said the Madras, Rajasthan, Delhi HCs began physical hearings, but closed down as lawyers didn't appear.</p>.<p>Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said one must remember that even during a pandemic, the court didn't deny access to justice. Since March 2020, the top court has been conducting hearings through video conferencing. It also passed a judicial order allowing the High Courts and district courts to conduct online hearings.</p>.<p>Hearing a batch of petitions for financial aids to lawyers, the court asked Mehta to convene a meeting to discuss the proposal of Bar associations for the Centre to arrange a sum of Rs three lakhs to struggling lawyers, with Bar councils and associations standing as guarantors.</p>.<p>"The Bar is primarily responsible to help lawyers, governments have a secondary role," the bench said.</p>.<p>The Bar Council of India, for its part, said its resources were completely drained.</p>
