Lawyers stage protest against spate of killings in UP

Hundreds of lawyers staged a demonstration outside the district magistrate's office here on Friday in protest against a spate of killings of lawyers in western Uttar Pradesh in the past two weeks.

Muzaffarnagar district bar association president Naseer Haider Kazmi and secretary Pradeep Malik told the media that they had sent a six-point memorandum to Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.

They demanded that the accused be held accountable in the deaths of lawyers Mukesh Sharma of Meerut, Sameer Saifi from Muzaffarnagar and Gulzar Ahmad of Shamli, and check the "deteriorating" law-and-order situation in the state.

Sharma was shot dead at a Meerut village last week by unidentified assailants. Saifi was found murdered and buried in the outskirts of Muzaffarnagar last Sunday.

Ahmad was returning from a court in Kairana when he was shot dead from close range on the Saharanpur-Delhi highway on Wednesday.