Supreme Court: Goa Govt Appoints AOR Omkar Jayant Deshpande as Standing Counsel
Omkar Jayant Deshpande appointed as Goa’s Standing Counsel in Supreme Court.
The Goa government has appointed Advocate-on-Record Omkar Jayant Deshpande as Standing Counsel for the state before the Supreme Court of India with immediate effect. The appointment was made through an order issued by the Department of Law and Judiciary on May 13, 2026.
As per the order, the allotment of cases before the Supreme Court will be made by the Chief Minister and the Advocate General on a case-to-case basis. Deshpande has also been directed to keep the Advocate General informed in advance about hearing dates and seek instructions whenever required.
A standing counsel is a lawyer appointed by a government department, public authority or institution to regularly represent it before courts. Unlike private lawyers engaged for individual matters, standing counsel handle multiple cases for the government and assist departments in legal strategy, filings and court appearances. In the Supreme Court, state governments usually appoint standing counsel to coordinate litigation arising from the state and represent it in constitutional, criminal, civil and service-related disputes.
Deshpande is an Advocate-on-Record at the Supreme Court, a qualification that permits advocates to file and conduct cases directly before the apex court. According to his profile, he is enrolled with the Bar Council of Maharashtra and Goa and obtained his BSL LLB degree from Pune University in 2016 and an LLM from Shivaji University in 2018. He also holds a diploma in Cyber Laws from the Asian School of Cyber Law, Pune.
He has been practising exclusively before the Supreme Court since 2021 after handling litigation before district courts, high courts and tribunals across the country. He has also represented banks, municipal corporations and industrial organisations and is empanelled as counsel for the State of Maharashtra in certain matters.
According to his profile, he has also appeared in matters relating to the Right to Education Act and the 2024 Kolkata rape case, where he represented the All India Federation of Government Doctors Association.