‘Police-lawyer nexus obstructing justice’

Observing that it is shameful to note that these so-called advocates play the role of “paid goondas”, a division bench comprising Justice N Kirubakaran and Justice R Pongiappan said, “If the police and the ‘so-called lawyers’(persons who claim to be lawyers and involved in criminal activities) join, it would go against the interest of the society.”

The matter came to light when a doctor approached the court seeking to direct the Bar Council of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry to identify the individuals in a video, who claiming to be advocates, trespassed into his clinic, threatened him and looted his clinic on March 14, 2018. He had also sought to direct the Mylapore police to hand over the keys to the clinic.

Even though the hearings have been in progress since June 4, with the property owner Hemanth Kumar being roped in as a respondent and the advocate involved in the incident being identified, a court direction was also obtained to register a FIR based on the doctor’s complaint.

But during the last hearing on June 12, the bench, on discovering that the FIR had been registered only at 8.45 AM that day and no action has been taken despite the complaint being lodged in March and a court direction on June 05, slammed the police.

Observing that the attitude of the police in this matter would exhibit how the police refuse to receive the complaint and register them even after a court directive, the bench said, “This incident is only a tip of an iceberg, wherein the ‘so-called advocates’ hand in glove with the police are violating the rights of poor citizens, contrary to the expectations that the police and advocates will safeguard their rights.”

Noting that the court must necessarily safeguard the citizens and cannot afford to take a lenient view merely because the accused are the “so-called advocates”, the bench said, “A number of cases are pending before this Court wherein the possession is said to have been forcibly taken from the occupants illegally by unruly advocates with the aid of the police. Therefore, a solution must be found by this court or else it would go against the interest of justice.”

Apprehension over the petitioner’s absence in the court during the last hearing owing to threat from either the accused lawyers or police or both, the bench has directed the police to produce the petitioner on Tuesday, when the case is listed for hearing.