19 lawyers get six-month jail term for rioting

NEW DELHI: Nineteen lawyers were on Friday sentenced to six months in prison for rioting during a protest in February 2005 against bifurcation of Tis Hazari courts here.
   
Metropolitan Magistrate Sandeep Yadav took a strong view of the violent agitation by the lawyers against carving out of Rohini courts and refused to release them on probation.
     
The lawyers, most of whom practise at Tis Hazari courts, were sentenced under various provisions of the IPC, including sections 144 (unlawful assembly armed with weapons) and 147 (rioting).
    
Police had arrested as many as 100 lawyers from Tis Hazari court complex in north Delhi after they vandalized court property and obstructed the normal functioning of the courts.
     
The chargesheet was, however, filed only against 19 lawyers as there were no sufficient evidence against the others, the police had claimed.