Advocates clerks’ assn wants office power charges waived

The century-old Tamil Nadu Advocates Clerks’ Association (TNACA) has requested State Law minister S Regupathy to grant exemption of electricity charges for the association premises inside the Madras High Court campus.

Its office-bearers, including president V Srinivasan, met the minister on Thursday and submitted a memorandum seeking the same. “We are finding it difficult to pay the power charges. Since 1968 to 2013, we have not paid any electricity charges and were given an exemption by the Madras High Court,” the representation reads. The association pointed out that as per the GOs issued by the Law department in 1981 and 1984, several associations including Madras Bar Association, Madras High Court Advocate Association, Women Lawyer Association, and Law Association functioning on HC campus are exempted from power charges.

“Since our association is also functioning inside the HC premises since 1913 for a similar purpose like other associations, we are also in a position to ask exemption,” the TNACA noted.

The association claimed it has been incurring maintenance expenses, staff salary, stationery etc and is finding it hard to pay electricity charges with corpus fund raised from the annual subscription of Rs 500 collected from its members.