THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A day after a group of lawyers assaulted a bench clerk in a courtroom at the Vanchiyoor court complex here, the police are yet to record the arrest of the culprits. On Tuesday, the Vanchiyoor police charged around 40 lawyers with non-bailable offences for the assault on the clerk, Nirmalanandan. The police on Wednesday said the arrest can be recorded only after a “proper investigation”. S R Nizam, Vanchiyoor CI, told TNIE, “The assault resulted from a grudge the lawyers nursed against the clerk. So it is impossible to arrest all of them all of a sudden. First, we need to identify them. A probe is on and they will be brought to book soon,” he said.
The police have invoked Section 143, 147 (rioting), Section 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), Section 506(1) (offence of criminal intimidation either to cause death or grievous hurt) and relevant sections of the Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act in the case. Meanwhile, Nirmalandan was discharged from the general hospital and his condition is stable. He was admitted to the hospital on Tuesday after he suffered injuries in the assault.
The advocates assaulted the bench clerk in the courtroom after he refused to give them the date of a case. The advocates also destroyed files kept in the courtroom.The incident occurred around 11.30am at Court number 11 after the magistrate completed the proceedings of a case and left the court. Though he resisted the advocates advances, telling them he would give the date of the case later, the lawyers hit him and abused him verbally.
According to his complaint, the lawyers nursed a grudge against him as he had given a statement in the court against the lawyers a few days ago in connection with an earlier incident where they had attacked a woman judge verbally.