Patna High Court Registers Suo Moto Case Against Advocate Accused Of Attempting To Rape Law Intern In Chamber

The Patna High Court on Tuesday initiated a suo motu case against an advocate, named Niranjan Kumar who has been accused of attempting to rape a law student-intern inside his office last month. The Bench of Chief Justice Sanjay Karol and Justice Partha Sarthy registered the case on the basis of the oral mentioning of the resolution passed by the co-ordination Committee of 3 Associations of the Patna High Court against the Advocate in question, condemning the alleged act committed by him against a law intern. The office bearers of the Associations and other advocates pointed out that the said advocate is violating the law with impunity and is roaming in the court complex. Also, there has been a past incident of similar nature by the very same advocate. In view of this, the Court passed the following order for the Registry: “…to forthwith register the resolution/complaint presented before this Court as a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) and after processing the same, list it today itself. We are also informed that a report in relation to past conduct of the very same advocate is lying in a sealed cover in the registry.” Further, when the matter came up before the court later on, it perused the resolutions and the allegations against the advocate and proceeded to issue a notice to him and made it returnable for January 19, 2023, i.e., the next date of hearing. It may be noted that the Bihar State Bar Council has already passed a resolution suspending him from practising in any court in India with immediate effect. Perusing the interim report of the fact-finding committee constituted by the Bihar State Bar Council, the High Court on Tuesday ordered the same to be kept in a sealed cover. For the uninitiated, the allegations against the accused advocate have been levelled against Advocate Kumar by a 21-year-old Law student from the Chanakya National Law University (CNLU), Patna. As per her complaint, she was working as an intern in Kumar’s office since December 1, 2022, and on the last day of her internship (December 23), Kumar sought sexual favours in the name of ‘Guru Dakshina’, asked her to stay with him in the night and also tried to rape her in his chamber. However, she somehow rescued herself and reported the incident to the police control room, after which the advocate-accused was arrested and an FIR was also lodged against him. Case title – Court on its own motion on the basis of resolution/complaint passed by Coordination Committee vs. The State of Bihar & Ors. Click Here To Read/Download Order

Patna High Court Registers Suo Moto Case Against Advocate Accused Of Attempting To Rape Law Intern In Chamber

Sparsh Upadhyay

Tags