Woman lawyer, team assaulted in court premises, Allahabad High Court seeks report

The Allahabad High Court directed the Lucknow district judge and police commissioner to submit reports on the alleged assault of three Delhi-based lawyers and their client inside the Lucknow court premises, observing that if the allegations were true, they would amount to a serious obstruction of the administration of justice.

In Short

• Allahabad High Court forms special bench to hear assault case on CJI's directions
• Woman lawyer, team and client from Delhi attacked inside Lucknow district court
• Court orders detailed reports from district judge and police protection till next hearing

Three Delhi-based lawyers, including two women advocates, and their client were allegedly assaulted, abused and threatened inside the Lucknow district court premises while attempting to appear in a civil property dispute, prompting the Allahabad High Court on Tuesday to take serious note of the incident and direct the Lucknow district judge and police commissioner to submit detailed reports by Wednesday morning.

A special bench of Justices Rajan Roy and Manjive Shukla was constituted on the directions of the Chief Justice at 7 pm on Tuesday to hear the matter on an urgent basis.

The court observed that if the allegations were true, the incident would go beyond a mere criminal offence and amount to a serious obstruction of the administration of justice, which could not be tolerated.

The matter came before the court through an interim application filed by Delhi-based advocates Abhipsa Mohanty, Komal Agrawal and Ashutosh Srivastava, who claimed that they were attacked while attempting to file a vakalatnama on behalf of their client, Mohammad Shakir, in a civil property dispute.

According to the application, the matter was transferred to another courtroom after the original court was found vacant. However, the lawyers said that advocate Saurabh Kumar Verma and some of his associates prevented them from appearing in court and assaulted, abused and threatened them when they objected.

The petition further claimed that Shakir was brutally beaten, sustaining bleeding injuries, and that the advocates were warned against appearing in a case involving another lawyer. They claimed they were forced to take refuge inside a judge's chamber before leaving the court premises through a staircase.

The applicants also said that a similar assault involving another litigant had taken place on April 30 in connection with the same property dispute, but no effective police action was taken.

During the hearing, the petitioners produced a video recording of the incident. After viewing the footage, the bench observed that it prima facie appeared that the litigant had been assaulted.

The court also noted that complaints of advocates or persons posing as advocates obstructing judicial proceedings at the Lucknow district court had surfaced earlier as well, leading to previous judicial directions and the creation of a special monitoring cell under the Joint Commissioner of Police.

Appearing through video conferencing, Lucknow Police Commissioner Amarendra Kumar Sengar informed the court that the injured litigant was undergoing medical examination and that a cross-complaint had also been received from the opposite side.

The district judge told the bench that CCTV footage from the court premises had been examined and that some lawyers had been identified.

The High Court directed the district judge to submit a detailed report along with the CCTV footage and asked the police commissioner to provide a status report on the incident, including details of the action taken and the criminal antecedents of the accused, if any.

The court also directed the Deputy Commissioner of Police concerned, the station house officer of Wazirganj police station and the injured litigant to remain present during the next hearing. It further ordered that adequate police protection be provided to the three Delhi-based advocates until further orders.

The matter has been listed for further hearing at 10:15 am on Wednesday.

- Ends