india

Updated: Nov 03, 2019 14:29 IST

The Delhi High Court on Sunday decided to take up for hearing the issue about Saturday’s clash between lawyers and police at the capital’s Tis Hazari court, PTI reported.

The court also issued a notice to the Centre, Bar Council of India, Bar Council of Delhi, Delhi government, all bar associations of district courts of Delhi and Delhi High Court Bar Association over the clash.

The court’s Registrar General Dinesh Kumar Sharma said chief justice D N Patel has taken a “very serious view” of the matter and that the high court is “deeply concerned about the safety of litigants and lawyers”.

Delhi Police and the lawyers, meanwhile, have registered FIRs against each-other in the case. The parking dispute on Saturday snowballed into a violent clash that left 50 people injured, including two advocates hit by gunshots, and many vehicles burned and vandalised.

Around 20 police personnel including Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (North) and two Station House Officers (SHOs) and eight advocates sustained injuries in the scuffle which broke out between police and advocates, according to ANI.

The Bar Council of India has called for a lawyers’ strike across district courts in Delhi on Monday.

The two-hour fight which began at around 2 pm, left a dozen motorcycles and a police vehicle on fire, eight prison vans vandalised, and the windows of many lawyers’ chambers and cars smashed. The fire from the burning vehicles also singed a portion of a court building.

Both the warring parties claim the trigger was a dispute over a lawyer parking his car near the court’s lock-up area. The lawyer was asked not to park there because it would obstruct the movement of jail vans, the police said. This led to a heated argument which escalated into a scuffle and soon erupted into violence.