Empanelment of Railway Advocates in various Tribunals, Courts and other Statutory bodies – Revision of Procedure by Railway Board vide Order dated 06.10.2025

भारत सरकार (GOVERNMENT OF INDIA)
रेल मंत्रालय (MINISTRY OF RAILWAYS)
रेलवे बोर्ड (RAILWAY BOARD)

No.2o24/LC/15/1

New Delhi, dated: 06.10.2025

The General Managers
All Zonal Railways
(including Production Units
Metro Railway, RDSO & CORE)

Sub:- Empanelment of Railway Advocates in various Tribunals, Courts and other Statutory bodies.

Ref:- This office letter Nos. 2022/LC/15/1 dated 11.o4.2023, 12.06.2023 and Letter No. 2024/ LC-III/ 21/2 dt. 09.04.2024.

Department of Legal Affairs, vide their O.M. No. J-11017/12/2021-Judicial dated 26.11.2024, has reviewed the arrangement for conduct of litigation of Railways before various courts and in light of this O.M., following decisions have been taken for conducting of litigation by Railways:

(i) Supreme Court & High Courts: Conduct of Railway’s litigation before Supreme Court and all High Courts be carried out by the Advocates/Counsels on panel of Department of Legal Affairs;

(ii) Tribunals (CAT/RCT etc.): For conducting Railway’s litigation before Tribunals, panel of advocates would be prepared by Ministry of Railways with the approval of Honble Minister of Railways and would be submitted for final concurrence of Hon’ble Minister of Law and Justice.

(iii) District & Subordinate Courts: For conducting Railway’s litigation before these courts, Advocates may be empanelled by Zonal Railways (with approval of GM) at prescribed eligibility conditions and fee terms. The database of Advocates so empanelled by Railways may be shared with Deptt. of Legal Affairs for sharing their services by other Departments/Ministries as well;

2. Detailed procedure to be adopted for empanelment of Advocates (para (ii) & (iii) above), is attached herewith.

3. This letter consolidates and supersedes all previous letters on the subject of empanelment of advocates.

(Mohd. Muqeem)
Legal Adviser/Railway
Railway Board

(Annexure of Board’s letter No.
2024/LC/15/ 1 dated: 06.10.2025)

Procedure for Empanelment of Advocates in various Tribunals/Courts for conducting litigation of Railways.

The procedure for empanelment of Railway Advocates for the purpose of the Central Administrative Tribunals, Railway Claim Tribunals, District Courts, Sub-ordinate Courts and others Statutory bodies has been consolidated & reviewed after Deptt. Legal Affairs O.M.’s dated. 26.11.2024 and it has been decided to devise the procedure as under:-

1. For Central Administrative Tribunal/Railway Claims Tribunals etc.:-

(a) The Zonal Railways shall invite the applications from the advocates, in the proforma specified at Annexure-I from the advocates possessing the requisite qualifications and experience as specified in Annexure-II, for empanelment.

(b) The applications shall be scrutinized on the basis of independent enquiry including physical verification of their offices, library or their sitting place. etc..

(c) The Zonal Railways shall shortlist approximately twice the number of applications required to be empanelled, for the purpose of personal interaction on the specified date/dates. However, such fixation of number of empanelled advocates per panel may be decided according to approximate number of cases of all Zonal Railways before the concerned Tribunal/Court by taking approx. 25 cases/advocate

(d) The personal interaction for panel formation/renewal would be conducted by a Committee of Officials nominated by Railway Board prior to conduct of interactions and such Committee will be headed by Legal Adviser, Railway Board.

(e) The list of advocates as finalized above by Legal Adviser, Railway Board shall be submitted to Hon’ble Minister of Railways for approval and Hon’ble Minister of Law & Justice for final concurrence.

(f) Railway panel for each CAT would be having one Standing Counsel. However, for CAT at Kolkata, where there are six Railway units (ER, SER, NFR, ECR, Metro & CLW) and to meet their workload, there will be two Standing Counsels (one each for (i) ER, NFR & Metro Railway, and (ii) SER, ECR, & CLW and their retainership fee will be paid by respective Zonal Railway, viz ER and SER respectively. For CAT/Mumbai, there will be two standing counsels, one for each zonal Railway (CR & WR), and their retainership fee will be paid by respective Zonal Railway.

(g) Further, for CAT panel, advocates may be segregated in panels as Special Counsels (Advocates with minimum 10 years exp. as Advocate) and Panel Counsels (Advocates with minimum 5 years exp. as Advocate). It is further clarified that Standing Counsel at CAT will be placed in list of Panel Counsels and not in Special Counsel.

2. District & Subordinate Courts:

(a) The Zonal Railways shall invite the applications from the advocates, in the proforma specified at Annexure I from the advocates possessing the requisite qualifications and experience as specified in the Annexure-II, for the empanelment.

(b) The applications shall be scrutinized on the basis of independent enquiry including physical verification of their offices, library or their sitting place, etc.

(d) The personal interaction will be conducted by the Officers of Zonal Railways, so nominated for the purpose by the concerned GMs, and they will finalize their final list of advocates to be empanelled.

(e) The list of advocates as finalized above shall be submitted to the General Manager for final approval and the power shall not be delegated. Arcopy of approved panel may be forwarded to Legal Adviser (Rlys) and Deptt. of Legal Affairs for availing the services of the panel Advocates by other Ministries/Departments as well.

3. Panel formation:

The panels will be formed Court-wise, i.e. all Railways/Units can utilize the panel of advocates of a particular Tribunal/Court.

4. Railway Officers having enrolled as Advocates after superannuation:

Superannuated Railways Officials, having legal background and experience in handling Railway’s legal matters and who have enrolled as Advocate, may be encouraged to apply by considering their tenure of handling legal cases in Railway, towards the laid down eligibility criteria.

5. Duties of Empanelled Advocates:

a) To appear in the said Tribunals, Courts and other Statutory bodies in the case assigned to them.

b) To give legal advice to the Zonal Railway on such civil, criminal and other matters arising in the course of administration of the Zonal Railway as are referred to them by DGM(Law) for Zonal headquarters and Sr.Law Officer/Law Officer in case of Divisions and Production Units, for the purposes of:-

i) Examination and settling of drafts of legal nature;

ii) Drafting of applications, petitions etc. to be filed in courts of law; However, final vetting of the documents will be done by the Officers of zonal Railways.

iii) Prompt removal/curing of defects in appeals/petitions filed, as may be pointed out by the registry:

c) Giving opinion regarding the admissibility of filing an appeal from such a decision not more than the three working days of the receipt of such order, when any case attended to by him is decided against the Zonal Railway.

d) To apply for the copy of the judgment of the Courts, Tribunals and other Statutory bodies in a case attended by him on the same day or the next day and provide the copy within seven days of the receipt of the order (excluding the time taken by the Court in preparation of the copy):

e) To render, if required, all assistance to the Law Officers, Special or Senior Counsel, who may be engaged in particular case before the Supreme Court, High Court, Tribunal etc.

f) To keep the Zonal Railway informed of the important developments in the case from time to time particularly with regard to drafting, filing of papers, dates of hearing of the case, order of the Court on the date of its pronouncement, supplying copies of judgment etc.

g) To furnish to the Zonal Railway monthly statement about the cases represented by him before the Tribunals, Courts and other Statutory bodies.

h) To perform such other duties of legal nature, which may be assigned to him by the Zonal Railway.

i) In case of deletion of name or change of panel counsel, the erstwhile panel counsel to hand over the case file to the concerned Law Officer within 5 working days.

6. Performance review:

The performance of the panel advocates/ counsels shall be reviewed by the Legal Adviser (Railways) 1n respect of Tribunals etc. and by GM of the concerned Zone in respect of District & Subordinate courts.

7. Allocation of cases:

The DGM(Law) (Sr. Law Officer in his absence) for zonal headquarters and Sr. Law Officer (Law Officer in his absence) for Railway’s Divisions and Production Units, would allot the cases amongst the empanelled advocates. A record of such allotment of the case would be maintained in DGM(Law)’s office which would be available for scrutiny whenever required, and a quarterly statement of the allotment would be submitted to the GM.

Further, for creating an easy interface with the Advocates, DGM(Law) of each zonal Railway would act as a single-window between zonal Railway and Advocates, for their interactions on all issues relating to court cases. The detail of such nominated officer should be mentioned in the Railway’s Order notifying the panel as well as updated on Railway’s website. DGM(Law) would be responsible/in-charge of all litigation in his zone, well supported by Legal Cadre officials.

8. Fee:

The fee of the advocates shall be paid/sanctioned by the competent Authority as per fee structure adopted by Ministry of Railways from time to time.

9. Period, Termination, Resignation, Addition and expiry of term:

a) The advocates shall be empanelled for the period of three years which may further be extended on yearly basis (max two times), subject to performance of the advocates as recommended by the Zonal Office and approved by Hon’ble MR & Hon’ble ML&J for Tribunals and GM of the zonal Railways for District Courts.

b) The counsels may resign by assigning any reason and such resignation would be effective from the date of acceptance by the Legal Adviser (Railways) in respect of Tribunals etc. and by GM of the concerned Zone in respect of District & Subordinate courts.

(c) The name of an advocate may also be removed from the panel on the basis of misconduct, Incompetency, Integrity or in public interest, etc., by Hon’ble MR & Hon’ble ML&J for Tribunals and GM of the zonal Railways for District Courts.

d) An advocate can also be added to the panel during the currency of the existing panel by Hon’ble MR & Hon’ble ML&J for Tribunals and GM of the zonal Railways for District Courts, with the stipulation that tenure of such advocate will be co-terminus with the main panel.

10. Removal of Difficulties: In respect of any clarification or removal of difficulties, the decision of the Legal Adviser (Railways) shall be final.

(Mohd. Muqeem)
Legal Adviser/ Railways
Railway Board

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Empanelment of Railway Advocates in various Tribunals, Courts and other Statutory bodies – Revision of Procedure