NAROWAL: Police registered on Tuesday a case against 121 lawyers for attacking and ransacking the office of Sialkot assistant commissioner.

Civil Lines police registered an FIR against the lawyers who attacked the AC’s office under sections 440/341 and 186 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) on the complaint of Naib Tehsildar Amir Adnan.

A large number of lawyers had attacked the AC’s office after she got demolished an “illegal” structure during an anti-encroachment drive in Sialkot.

The lawyers alleged the action was unjustified as it defied a court’s stay order in the matter.

In his complaint to police, the naib tehsildar stated that some 100-120 lawyers of the district bar association led by Advocate Humayun Pervez Bhutta barged into the office of Sialkot AC Ms Sonia Sadaf by breaking its door and ransacked it.

He said the enraged lawyers threw out the office’s furniture and removed the name plate of Ms Sadaf fixed there.

The AC was not present in her office when it was attacked.

He said after attacking the office, the lawyers gathered at Kachehri Chowk and used abusive language against the woman officer.

The complainant also submitted a CCTV footage of the lawyers’ attack and vandalism with the application to police for registration of a case against the attackers.

The police registered an FIR against Advocate Bhatta and 120 other unknown lawyers on the complaint.

Mr Adnan told Dawn that the AC had got encroachments demolished that enraged the lawyers who attacked her office.

Deputy Commissioner Tahir Farooq said the issue surfaced after the AC took action against encroachments on a piece of land in Mohalla Prem Nagar, claiming that the matter had been resolved.

Published in Dawn, November 17th, 2021