An interesting PIL has been moved in the Supreme Court seeking direction to the Department of Justice to issue guides/ handbooks in simple English and in vernacular languages.
These books need to explain to a lay person the laws, procedures, rights and redressal of grievances.
Interestingly the PIL is filed by a lawyer! He says that most lawyers’ writing are verbose, dull, pompous, have arcane words, phrases and a tendency to use too many legal jargons. He wants the writings to be simple and easily understood by a common person instead of beating around the bush. He suggests the introduction of a mandatory subject of “Legal Writing in Plain English,” in 3rd and 5th year of LLB courses.
Doctors writings are antithetic to that of the lawyers! They prefer short sentences, full of technical words and most importantly write in a most shabby manner. At least the prescriptions need to be clear in terms of spellings and advise of medication courses.
Perhaps, doctors need to undergo a short course on legibly writing their reports, prescriptions and instructions.
Recently the Centre had mandated the doctors to write in a neat hand but it appears that the rule is still to be implemented.
