Several Members of Parliament (MPs), including CPI (M) leader Elamaram Kareem, on Tuesday wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking immediate action over Delhi Police raids on advocate Mehmood Pracha's office last year.
In the letter, the opposition leaders highlighted "a serious breach in the processes of justice by the Delhi Police."
"A Supreme Court lawyer, Mehmood Pracha, who is representing a number of cases of communal violence victims and other cases involving members of the ruling party at the Centre, was subjected to search and seizure by a large group of armed police personnel of the Special Cell Delhi police who barged into his office and conducted searches for over twelve hours," the letter read.
The MPs argued that the incident sets a "shocking precedent", and questioned the Centre's authority to break a primary principle of justice that is the lawyer-client confidentiality.
"The purpose was to access computers which had files of many of these sensitive cases. This sets a shocking precedent. If a lawyer is representing cases, not to the liking of the Government, has the police the right to raid the lawyer's office and break a primary principle of justice which is the confidentiality between a lawyer and the client?" the letter added.
The letter also mentioned that the Supreme Court Bar Association has registered a strong protest in this context.
"The seizures of confidential information which is protected by lawyer client privilege, in a search conducted by the very police authorities who are prosecuting the lawyer's clients, will prejudicially affect the rights and guarantees of the accused. It is illegal and contravenes all cannons of protection available to a client and his lawyers," said the association in a resolution.
The opposition leaders further remarked that a strong message must go out to the Delhi Police that such lawless behaviour will not be tolerated, and urged PM Modi to take urgent and immediate action against those responsible.
Pracha has submitted before this court that a search was conducted at his office on December 24, 2020, and according to the provisions of Section 165 CrPC, the agency should have intimated forthwith the search and the seized articles to the concerned Magistrate.
However, Pracha submitted that the same has not been done and therefore, he has filed an application under section 165(5) CrPC and submitted that the entire search was videographed as per court order dated December 22. He submitted that he is entitled to a copy of video footage.
Meanwhile, Delhi Police had alleged that Pracha forged documents and instigated a man to depose falsely in connection with a case related to the violence in north-east Delhi in February last year.
Pracha has been representing various accused and complainants in the violence in north-east Delhi.
Various cases were registered over the north-east Delhi violence, in which at least 53 people were killed and several others were injured.
On December 27, a court here on Sunday directed Delhi Police to preserve the entire video footage of the search conducted in Pracha's house.
( With inputs from ANI )
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