Introduction
Can an investigating agency summon a defence lawyer and ask what their client told them? Until the end of October 2025, the answer in practice was murkier than the statute suggested it should be. A landmark Supreme Court ruling has now drawn the line precisely, and it runs directly through this one provision.
Section 132 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 (BSA) is the lawyer-side half of the privilege framework this run has been building — the duty Section 133 and Section 134, covered in the two previous articles, both reference directly. This piece explains the section's two narrow exceptions, the Supreme Court's fresh, detailed directions on when an advocate can actually be summoned, and a limitation on who counts as a protected "advocate" at all that surprises many in-house lawyers.
132. Professional communications.
No advocate shall at any time be permitted, unless with his client's express consent, to disclose any communication made to him in the course and for the purpose of his service as such advocate, by or on behalf of his client, or to state the contents or condition of any document with which he has become acquainted in the course and for the purpose of his professional service, or to disclose any advice given by him to his client in the course and for the purpose of such service:
Provided that nothing in this section shall protect from disclosure — (1) any such communication made in furtherance of any illegal purpose; (2) any fact observed by any advocate, in the course of his service as such, showing that any crime or fraud has been committed since the commencement of his service.
The provisions of this section shall apply to interpreters, and the clerks or employees of advocates.
Section 132 BSA and Section 126 IEA: Modernised Wording, Same Substance
Section 132 carries over Section 126 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 in full substance, updating two terms in the same modernisation pattern seen in Section 133: "barrister, pleader, attorney or vakil" becomes "advocate," and "employment" becomes "service." The two exceptions — communications made in furtherance of an illegal purpose, and facts showing a crime or fraud committed since the advocate's engagement began — are unchanged, along with the extension of the duty to interpreters and to an advocate's clerks or employees.
| Aspect | Section 126, Indian Evidence Act, 1872 | Section 132, BSA, 2023 |
|---|---|---|
| Who is bound | "barrister, pleader, attorney or vakil" | "advocate" — matching the Advocates Act, 1961 |
| Basis of the relationship | "employment" | "service" — same substance, modernised term |
| Exceptions | Illegal purpose; crime or fraud since engagement began | Identical, unchanged |
The Two Statutory Illustrations, As the Act Itself Gives Them
The Act's own illustrations mark the boundary precisely. A client who confesses guilt to their advocate while seeking a defence remains fully protected — defending a person known to be guilty is not itself a criminal purpose, so the communication stays privileged. But a client who tells an advocate, "I wish to obtain possession of property by using a forged deed, on which I request you to sue," has made a communication in furtherance of an illegal purpose, and Section 132 does not protect it. Separately, if an advocate observes an entry in a client's account book showing that a fraud has been committed since the advocate's engagement began, that observed fact is not protected either — the crime-or-fraud exception applies regardless of whether the client intended the advocate to notice it.
The October 2025 Turning Point: In Re: Summoning Advocates
On 31 October 2025, a bench of the Supreme Court led by Chief Justice B.R. Gavai, together with Justices K. Vinod Chandran and N.V. Anjaria, decided In Re: Summoning Advocates Who Give Legal Opinion or Represent Parties During Investigation of Cases and Related Issues, 2025 INSC 1275 — a suo motu matter taken up after growing concern over investigating agencies routinely summoning defence lawyers to question them about their own clients. The Court held that a lawyer can be summoned only where one of three things is true: the client has waived the privilege or given consent; the communication furthered an illegal purpose; or the advocate observed a crime or fraud during the engagement — precisely the framework already written into Section 132's proviso. Summoning a lawyer for merely appearing for or advising an accused person, the Court held, violates Articles 19(1)(g) and 21 of the Constitution and cannot stand.
The Court summarised the underlying principle memorably: the "power to summon is not the power to destroy" — investigative authority cannot be used as a route around a privilege the same Act protects directly.
The Limitation Few Expect: In-House Counsel Are Not Covered
The same judgment drew a boundary that surprises many corporate legal teams. The Court held that in-house counsel are not entitled to Section 132's privilege, because they are not "advocates practising in courts" within the meaning the BSA uses. Section 132 protects the relationship between a client and an advocate enrolled and practising as such — an employee lawyer advising their own employer internally, without independently practising before courts, falls outside that definition, however similar the advisory relationship may feel in substance to outside counsel's role.
Worked Example One: A Summons That Cannot Stand
An investigating agency, building a case against a company director, summons the director's defence advocate and demands to know the substance of their conversations about the case strategy. The advocate has not consented, the communications were made for the ordinary purpose of preparing a defence, and no crime or fraud during the engagement has been identified. Following In Re: Summoning Advocates, this summons cannot stand — none of the three permitted grounds applies, and the agency would additionally need a superior officer's prior approval even if one did.
Worked Example Two: The In-House Counsel Gap
The same investigation instead seeks the advice a company's in-house legal counsel gave to management about a disputed transaction. Even though that advice was confidential and legal in nature, Section 132 does not shield it the way it would shield advice from outside counsel, because the in-house lawyer is not practising as an advocate before courts. Companies that assume all internal legal advice carries the same protection as advice from a retained law firm may find that assumption does not hold up under this specific limitation.
Why This Matters in Practice
For defence counsel, In Re: Summoning Advocates gives a concrete, citable authority to resist a summons that rests on nothing more than having represented or advised a client — and confirms that a superior officer's prior approval is now a mandatory procedural checkpoint even where a genuine exception applies. For companies and their legal departments, the in-house counsel limitation is a practical planning point: the most sensitive internal legal assessments — the ones a company would most want protected if investigators came calling — may warrant involving outside counsel specifically to secure Section 132's protection, rather than relying on an internal team alone.
Key Takeaways
- Section 132 BSA carries over Section 126 IEA in substance, modernising "barrister, pleader, attorney or vakil" to "advocate" and "employment" to "service."
- The only two exceptions remain communications made in furtherance of an illegal purpose, and facts showing a crime or fraud observed since the advocate's engagement began.
- In Re: Summoning Advocates, 2025 INSC 1275 (31 October 2025), confirms an advocate can be summoned only on consent/waiver, illegal purpose, or observed crime/fraud — and requires a superior officer's prior approval even then.
- The privilege continues even after the advocate-client relationship ends.
- In-house counsel do not receive Section 132's protection, since they are not advocates practising before courts — a limitation that catches many corporate legal teams by surprise.
Conclusion
Section 132 has always drawn a tight, two-exception boundary around what an advocate can be made to disclose — what changed in October 2025 is how firmly the Supreme Court insisted investigating agencies actually respect it, and how precisely the Court mapped who the protection covers at all. Together with Sections 133 and 134, it completes a deliberately narrow, carefully guarded framework for legal-advice privilege in Indian law. The next article in this run moves from privileged legal advice to a different kind of protected disclosure — information given to authorities about the commission of an offence, under Section 131.