Saeed Khan/TNN

Ahmedabad, Jun 12: Why did you get me acquitted? This is what a client is asking his lawyer after the latter got a criminal complaint against him quashed in the Gujarat High Court. The reason put forth by the client is that the complaint lodged at the Navrangpura police station was well substantiated and his lawyer had no right to get it cancelled without his consent.

This strange case has come up before the Bar Council of Gujarat.

The case pertains to a complaint that was lodged in connection with the controversial Natraj Cinema-Dairyden demolition case on Ashram road. A scrap dealer Ashok Mistry was also named as one of nine accused by the parlour operator for illegally demolishing the outlet along with the cinema’s building on the Ashram Road in 2006.

The complainant Bhavan Desai had alleged that the seller as well as those who purchased the building, along with a couple of local goons had demolished the Dairyden icecream parlour and made him keep quiet at gun-point. Mistry, who was also present there, was named in the complaint.

However, Mistry feels that while he was innocent, the other accused, cinema owner and the buyers, had wrongly implicated him in the case. Therefore, when his advocate Ami Yajnik moved a quashing petition and Justice Akil Kureshi in October 2007 quashed the complaint, Mistry felt that he would otherwise also have been discharged from the case.

Mistry feels that because his lawyer got the complaint quashed, eight other accused, whom he considers real culprits, also went scot-free. He has complained that he was made to suffer by other accused persons, and he would see to it that they were duly punished.

Before writing to the Bar Council, Mistry also dashed off two notices to Yagnik accusing her of moving a quashing petition without his consent and doing so in order to help other accused. Mistry, in his notice to Yagnik, has claimed that she had in connivance with other accused moved a quashing petition without taking his consent.

He has also accused her of forgery and claimed that he was duped because he didn’t know English. He urged the Bar Council to initiate action against the advocate for working in the interest of other accused, whom Mistry wanted to get punished. He also asked the lawyer to revive the case in the High Court and begin prosecution once again.

On the other hand, Yagnik has termed this an attempt to defame her and claimed that Mistry, with ulterior motives, has been charging her of professional misconduct. She has also rubbished accusations of forgery.

Moreover, to Mistry’s demand to reopen the case, she said in her reply, “The High Court has quashed the complaint. Still, if you wish you can get another complaint lodged by Bhavan Desai and get yourself prosecuted, you can go ahead through some other advocate and admit to the crime and get yourself convicted.”