Two builders, 4 cops booked over assault on lawyer in Noida

Two builders and four police constables were booked by the police in Gautam Budh Nagar Wednesday in connection with the alleged assault on a lawyer on September 16, according to officials.

A purported video has been doing the rounds on social media since Sunday in which a police constable was seen slapping the advocate amid an altercation between them. The incident had occurred inside a room at the Garhi Chaukhandi police outpost.

An FIR was registered at the Phase 3 police station on a compliant by the advocate who alleged that the assault on him in Sector 121 was a "conspiracy" by the policemen concerned and the two builders.

The complainant has claimed a dispute on the property on which the two builders have created an apartment building using unfair means and the case over the ownership on a part of the land is pending in a court.

"On September 16, I was outside the building to distribute 'warning pamphlets' to potential home-buyers that this building is disputed. Soon, the two builders along with some of their workers reached there and asked me not to do such publicity because it would hurt their business.

"About 15-20 minutes later, four constables arrived at the spot and asked him to stop distributing the pamphlets. When I did not, they forcibly took me in their vehicle and brought to the police outpost," the lawyer claimed in the complaint.

"At a room in the police outpost they started thrashing me and tried to choke me and when one of my cousins came there, he started filming the incident. One of the constables dragged him out of the room," he alleged further.

The Phase 3 police station has lodged an FIR against the two builders and the four constables under Indian Penal code sections 147 (rioting), 307 (attempt to murder), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt) and 504 (insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace), according to the FIR copy.

The builders could not be contacted for response immediately.

On Monday, hundreds of lawyers assembled on the premises of the district and sessions court in Surajpur as they struck work to protest the assault on their colleague and later marched to the offices of the district magistrate and the district police chief.

Gautam Buddh nagar police chief Ajay Pal Sharma had suspended one constable while six others of the Garhi Chaukhanid outpost were transferred to police lines in the wake of the incident.