'Illegal and unjustified': Advocate Pracha moves court over searches

New delhi: The Delhi Police's Special Cell on Tuesday searched the office of advocate Mehmood Pracha, who has been fighting cases on behalf of many accused in Delhi riots that broke out in February 2020, the lawyer claimed on Tuesday.

This is the second time that Pracha's office is being searched. The police had searched Pracha's office in December too.

"Mehmood's office was raided by Special Cell around 12:30 pm. At around 4 pm Pracha moved an urgent application to the Patiala Court of Pankaj Sharma, who had issued the search warrants, notice has been issued to the IO and DCP Special Cell has been directed to be personally present in the court on Wednesday," an associate of Pracha told Millennium Post.

Pracha said the Delhi Police's demand to take away the hard disks of his computers was "completely illegal and unjustified". The advocate said the documents that the authorities have asked for were "already in their possession from the previous exercise".

According to the associate, who wished to remain anonymous, more than 100 policemen were present at the office.

However, officials of the Delhi Police said that they had gone to conduct the searches at the premises but had returned after finding it was locked. They added that the IO of the case had then called Pracha on the phone, who promised to assist the officers with executing the search warrant on Wednesday (today), after which the team returned.

Pracha's urgent application before the court said, "Although an actually free and fair investigation would reveal the real truth that the present case is completely baseless and has been instituted with the sole objective of hounding the applicant/accused at the behest of and as a part of a conspiracy involving senior politicians, bureaucrats and even judicial officers, yet, as has been previously been submitted during the hearings in this matter, the applicant is going to the extent of risking self-implication even in derogation of his Fundamental Right only for the sake of protecting the data and information pertaining to his clients and briefs (completely unconnected to the allegations being investigated) which is his bounden duty as an advocate, under the law of the land."