Sene members thrash Anna supporters

The latter had objected to sloganeering against senior Supreme Court advocate and Hazare's aide Prashant Bhushan

Sene members thrash Anna supporters

The latter had objected to sloganeering against senior Supreme Court advocate and Hazare's aide Prashant Bhushan

In the aftermath of some Sri Ram Sene members attacking Prashant Bhushan, members of Team Anna gathered in New Delhi on Thursday to support the senior advocate.

They were, however, in for a rude shock when Sene members attacked them as well, while demanding an early release of the three accused in the case.

The incident took place outside gate number 2 of Patiala House Courts complex. A group of Sene members also reached the spot.

An Anna supporter who was beaten up by members of Sri Ram Sene
outside Patiala House Courts in New Delhi on Thursday

An argument broke out when Anna supporters objected to sloganeering against Hazare and Bhushan by the Sene members. The argument soon degenerated into a scuffle and Sene members thrashed two of the five Anna supporters.

Sources said more than 50 supporters from both sides had assembled outside the court. Heavy police force that was already deployed there immediately intervened in the matter.

"The victims were identified as Mohammad Shoufi and Raj Kumar. They were immediately taken to Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital," said a senior police official.

Past incident
On Wednesday, members of Shri Ram Sene had barged in the chamber of senior advocate Prashant Bhushan in Supreme Court of India and thrashed him for his speech over Kashmir, wherein he had said a referendum should be held over the Kashmir issue.u00a0

Inder Verma, Delhi president of Shri Ram Sene, was arrested on the spot for assaulting Bhushan while his other associates managed to flee. Later, they were arrested too.
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Delhi Police will go through the CCTV footage of the court premises to identify the Thursday attackers. A police source said they will lodge an FIR and will arrest the persons whou00a0 attacked Anna supporters. The source said three Anna supporters received injuries and their statements have been recorded.

Sene attackers sent to judicial custody
Inder Verma, Vishnu Gupta and Tajender Pal Singh Bagga, who attacked senior lawyer and Team Anna member Prashant Bhusan on Thursday, were remanded to one-day judicial custody by Patiala House Court yesterday.
The trio will be produced in the court again on Friday.

Verma was arrested on Thursday while Vishnu and Bagga were arrested yesterday, when they were on their way to surrender themselves in court. Delhi police told the court they wanted the accused to be remanded to two-day police custody to interrogate them, but the court rejected the plea.

"I remand them to one-day judicial custody. The application of police for their custodial interrogation would be dealt with by the court concerned," Metropolitan Magistrate of Patiala House Court, Jasjeet Kaur, said.

Meanwhile, Bagga, Verma and Gupta refused to undergo Test Identification Parade (TIP) by Bhushan on the ground that they had been "all over the TV news channels" and thus TIP is vitiated.