Updated
New Delhi, Feb 17 (NDTV): The JNU student leader arrested on charges of sedition was attacked today as he was brought to a Delhi court to find out if he will get bail.
Before the arrival of Kanhaiya Kumar, a group of lawyers assaulted a student and a journalist as the police failed to intervene or control the chaos, delivering a shocking duplicate of Monday's assaults on journalists, students and teachers who had gathered at the same court for.
Kumar, the 28-year-old President of the JNU Students Union, was brought to court amid the chaos.
"I am really shamed," said Soli Sorabjee, one of India's most eminent lawyers. "They are goons. Lawyers don't behave this way."
Cops were in riot gear as stones were thrown at the media by lawyers who earlier hit a reporter from news organization Firstpost and a student who described himself as a support of Kumar.
Based on Monday's violence, which saw lawyer attacking the media and supporters of Kumar, the Supreme Court this morning issued orders greatly limiting access to the lower court where Kumar's case is being heard. But before the student arrived there, two groups of lawyers clashed as they shouted competing slogans supporting or deriding JNU or the prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Vikram Chauhan, a lawyer who has not been arrested despite being filmed attacking people on Monday, was at the heart of today's chaos as well. In open defiance of the Supreme Court's orders, he climbed the gate of the lower court. He alleged that he was provoked by students who support Kumar.
"They are trying to beat us up and we don't even respond? People who said 'Pakistan Zindabad' have been made heroes and we are being called 'gundas (goons),'" he said to news agency ANI.
The arrest of Kumar has turned into a highly-emotive and politically-charged controversy, with the opposition and large sections of the JNU students and faculty accusing the government of an unwarranted crackdown on campus dissent. However, the government says it has evidence that Kumar delivered anti-India slogans at JNU last week, and that the sedition charge against him is deserved.
Earlier Report
Ignoring SC order, men in black robes beat scribe, student at Delhi court
New Delhi, Feb 17 (PTI): In an open defiance of Supreme Court order, a large group of men dressed in lawyers' robes today again barged into the Patiala House court complex and allegedly beat up a journalist and a student ahead of the hearing in the sedition case of JNU students' union President Kanhaiya Kumar.
The group, which could be seen raising slogans "Vande Mataram" and waving India's flag in the court premises, was led by Vikram Chauhan, one of the lawyers who had attacked JNU students and faculty on February 15.
The journalist, identified as Anwar of news channel CNN IBN, said despite heavy police deployment, clashes erupted in the court complex and the cops' presence did not deter the lawyers from shouting slogans and fighting with journalists and students.
The Supreme Court had, earlier in the day, restricted the number of people inside the courtroom, allowing only five reporters and two supporters of the arrested students to attend the hearing.
The apex court had acted on a petition that alleged that the police were a "mute spectator to the brazen display of brute force" on February 15.
On Monday, groups of lawyers had beaten up journalists and JNU students and teachers ahead of the hearing of the sedition case registered against Kumar.
Yesterday, top editors of national media and hundreds of journalists had hit the streets demanding action against those involved in beating up members of their fraternity in the court complex in police presence.
The journalists had also sought Supreme Court's intervention in protecting freedom of speech.