Satya Prakash
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, September 13
Accusing members of Gurugram and Sohna Bar bodies of physically stopping lawyers from representing the accused in the Pradyuman Thankur murder case, Northern zone head of Ryan Group Francis Thomas on Wednesday moved the Supreme Court, seeking transfer of the case to Delhi.
Senior advocate KTS Tulsi mentioned Thomas’s petition before a Bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra which posted the matter for hearing on September 18.
Tulsi contended every accused had a fundamental right to be represented by a lawyer of his choice and the bar body’s decision amounted to violation of this all-important right of accused Thomas.
Tulsi alleged that the Bar bodies at Sohna and Gurugram in Haryana have asked their member lawyers not to represent any person or accused in the murder of the seven-year-old boy on the school campus on Friday.
“The fundamental right under Article 21 (Right to Life and Personal Liberty) is being infringed,” Tulsi submitted. He urged the top court to shift the case from Sohna in Haryana to a trial court at Saket in the national capital.
The district Bar associations of Gurugram and Sohna had passed a resolution on September 9 not to defend the accused in this case, Tulsi pointed out. The Class 2 student was found with his throat slit on the morning of September 8 in the toilet of Ryan International School in Gurugram. Police allege that 42-year-old bus conductor Ashok Kumar killed him with a knife after the boy resisted an attempt to sodomise him. Thomas was arrested on Monday in connection with the murder.
This is the third petition filed in the Supreme Court in connection with the case, the first and the second being from the slain child’s father and two woman lawyers, respectively. While his father sought a CBI probe and guidelines for child safety, the woman lawyer duo wanted a set of “non-negotiable” guidelines for the safety of school-going children across India.
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