DHCBA President Rajiv Khosla to challenge arrest warrant for allegedly assaulting lawyer in 1994

A Metropolitan Magistrate’s court in Tis Hazari has recently issued a non-bailable warrant against the President of the Delhi High Court Bar Association, Rajiv Khosla. The warrant, dated August 17, has been issued over an FIR that was registered more than two decades ago in 1994..As reported by Zee News in 2005, Khosla had allegedly assaulted and manhandled a lady lawyer, Sujata Kohli, after she refused to take part in a lawyers’ strike at Tis Hazari way back in 1994..The report states,.On July 29, 1994 he allegedly threatened to withdraw all her facilities and also removed tables and chairs in her chamber in Tis Hazari premises following which she filed a civil suit for injunction. .Kohli alleges that when she came to the court complex to attend the hearing in the case a week later, the accused along with 40 to 50 others beat her, pulled her hair and threatened to shut her inside a room..Kohli, who went on to become the Presiding Officer of the Karkardooma Labour Court, filed an F.I.R soon thereafter. The FIR (No. 177/1994) charges Khosla with the offences under Sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code..Initially, a bailable warrant was issued against Khosla. However, the MM’s order (see below) notes that Khosla failed to appear in the matter, and neither did his lawyer. Subsequently Metropolitan Magistrate Vandana Jain issued a non-bailable warrant..Advocate Abhijat, Secretary of the DHCBA, told Bar & Bench that he was shocked at the chain of events..“Never before has the office of the president of the DHCBA, a premier body of advocates, has been disgraced so much..It is a matter of sorrow that we are now led by people who have no respect for the legal system. That a lawyer could physically beat up a lady, that too a colleague, makes one hang his head in shame.”.On the other hand Khosla says that the entire case is completely false, and has no semblance to the truth..“A false FIR has been filed against me. I have appeared over a hundred times in this matter over the past years and not even a single witness has showed up. .On June 30, I was unwell and sought an exemption from arguing because I have been arguing this matter all on my own. I was told that the next date of hearing is September 12. Nobody told me that I was to appear before that.”.Regarding the issuance of the non-bailable warrant itself, Khosla said,.“On July 18, the court issued a bailable warrant against me, which was never served and without trying to serve the warrant again, they went ahead and issued a NBW on August 17. .Everyone knows who I am and where my house is. The court should have made sure that the warrant was properly served.”.He is planning on filing an application tomorrow against the order issuing the NBW.. Read an uncertified copy of the August 17 order below.