While going through the archives, this is what was published in the Fall of 1996 in The Kathmandu Post. *********************** Covering Nepal's legal profession by Ashutosh Tiwari More than a decade ago, the American legal profession used to enjoy virtually no press coverage. Sure, the press did cover the details of public-interest cases and the decisions of various courts. But the legal profession itself was left largely unprobed -- letting it be just a high-salaried, upper-class, exclusively discreet club of White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant male attorneys. That elite clubbiness started to shake, however, upon the publication of "American Lawyer" -- an independent newspaper devoted solely to the legal profession. Overnight, lawyers from Hawaii to Maine were waking up to read who among them were the worst-paid, the most corrupt, the most sexist, the most racist, the most unethical, the most involved in issues of conflict-of-interest, the most unfair to employees and so forth. The effects of these reports, in tandem with changes in the general American society, were enormous. Stung by first-rate journalism that laid bare their ethical failings and professional lapses, the lawyers discovered that -- lo and behold! -- they had to be accountable not only to the toting up of 'billable hours', but, more importantly, to that elusive precept called public responsibility. In fact, so traumatizing was this 'discovery' that by the early '90s, virtually all major American law schools were requiring their students to take a course on 'legal ethics'[however oxymoronic that may sound]. I use this [analogy] to point out that by exposing the corrupt and the unethical within the legal profession, only responsible [investigative] journalism can make the democratic principles of rights and liberties relevant in citizens' lives. Yet, considering that we in Nepal now live under the 'rule of law', laws and lawyers have hardly ever been subjects of probing reports and analyses. A few months ago [July, 1996], for example, an illiterate woman attempted to kill herself at the Supreme Court in Kathmandu. Yet, neither the Nepal Bar Association nor any of the legal fraternities (much less a single Nepali human-rights NGO) saw it fit to issue a statement. What's more, not a single journalist delved into the story to inform the public what had happened in the course of the woman's legal proceedings, and why. Sadly, the thing is that that woman could have been any one of Nepal's millions of other illiterate women. And, when the legal profession and the press fail to react to that story and others with due gravity and sensitivity, something about our democracy dies. It's also disturbing to see the lawyers and the courts in Nepal put themselves up on a pedestal, as though anything anyone says against them could be inflated as a "maan-haani" (defamation) issue -- with the accused rushed through the system to be fined and jailed. Such paranoia is ultimately self-defeating, however; for all it does is stifle debates and investigations, thereby unwittingly reinforcing the all-too-common perception that by not being open and transparent about what they do about public-interest issues, Nepali lawyers, their professional organizations and the courts do have much to hide. Then again, that's why we need more investigative journalists -- the intelligently crusading ones who are not afraid to take the risks to cut through the obscure (Nepali-kagat-style) legalese to bring out the public truth about how and why Nepal's legal profession and the court-systems really work or do not work. To be sure, a separate publication with the name Nepali Wokil devoted only to covering the legal profession may not be financially viable in Nepal. But a good start would be made if only some of our finest journalists stretched the limits of this "maan- haani" bugaboo by critically and consistently covering the legal issues and all sections of the legal profession for their newspapers. (Added later: Yes, the American legal professsion is still no bastion of saints (not will it ever be!), but because of the press, it's now more open and transparent than ever before. The Nepali press could similarly look into the Nepali legal profession.) [Originally published in The Kathmandu Post in the Fall of 1996.]