A few days before Eid this year, 15-year-old Junaid was brutally murdered by a hate-spewing mob on a train near Ballabhgarh in Uttar Pradesh. Now, the judge hearing the case has sought action against a senior Haryana government lawyer for allegedly helping the persons charged with killing the boy.

The Indian Express reported that additional district and sessions judge, Faridabad, YS Rathore, has said in an interim order dated October 25 that Haryana additional advocate general Naveen Kaushik has been assisting the counsel of the main accused, Naresh Kumar, in cross-examination of prosecution witnesses.

According to court records, the judge said Kaushik was “suggesting questions to be put to the witnesses” at hearings on October 24 and 25.

“This act of Mr Naveen Kaushik amounts to professional misconduct and is against legal ethics and highly unbecoming of an advocate, particularly because he is a law officer in the office of the advocate general, Haryana,” judge Rathore was quoted as saying.

The judge pointed out that the case is a sensitive one, in which “according to the prosecution case, one boy of a minority community was killed during quarrel in a train over sharing of seats with passengers of the majority community after the deceased was allegedly abused on religious lines”.

He said that if Kaushik appears along with the defence counsel “it will send a wrong signal and will also create a feeling of insecurity amongst the victim party and will adversely affect the aim of the court to conduct a free and fair trial”. Kaushik told The Indian Express that “it is a wrong impression” that he was assisting the defence counsel.