Mistaken identity: Lawyer kidnapped,set free later

According to Sharma,he was getting in his car inside the Karkardooma court complex around 4.30 pm when five armed men forced him to take the wheels and drive to Shalimar Garden. There,they abandoned Sharma’s car,made him get into another Maruti-800 and took him to Jaoli village near Ghaziabad,Uttar Pradesh,the FIR says.

The complaint says the accused persons took Sharma to a farm and roughed him while forcing him to sign some blank papers. They also fired two shots near his body to scare him,the FIR says.

According to the complainant,a sixth person appeared around midnight and told the abductors that they had picked up a “wrong” person. He reportedly said Sharma was “not the one” he wanted.

Thereafter,the FIR says,the accused dropped him at Bhopura in Ghaziabad and returned his car after issuing threats against making the issue public. The assailants also took away his wallet,driving licence,ATM cards and cellphone,Sharma complained.

Sharma then approached the police in Anand Vihar — the FIR has been registered under IPC Sections 365 (abduction),384 (extortion) and 34 (common intention).

“I have been practising in courts since 1985 and have never heard of an incident like this — a lawyer gets abducted from court premises and is then released because he was not the right person,” Sharma told Newsline on Tuesday. He said none of the accused was covering his face,and that two of them could even be juveniles.

Raising the issue of inadequate police presence in the court complex,Shahdara Bar Association president Mahesh Sharma said: “The area DCP and ACP were present in the court premises when the incident occurred. If a lawyer can be abducted this way,we should better not talk about safety of the litigants.”