The district administration removed a statue of Dalit icon B R Ambedkar from the court premises here, earning the ire of the Ghaziabad bar association.
The bronze statue was reportedly installed at the court compound by the association on New Year's eve.
Bar association president Rakesh Tyagi Kakda alleged that the district administration committed "dacoity" by forcibly removing the statue.
Many lawyers from the district also sat on a strike against the move today.
Kakda said lawyers from the district along with their counterparts in Hapur and Gautama Budh Nagar districts would abstain from work, if the statue was not reinstalled immediately.
"In case the administration will not reinstall the idol, the agitation will spread across Uttar Pradesh and the judicial work will get hampered," he said.
District Magistrate Ritu Maheshwari, however, said no permission was sought by the bar to install the statue.
"Without the permission of the government, no statue of iconic personalities can be installed at public or private places. The statue in question is in police custody. It will be reinstalled after due permissions are taken," she said.
The administration has also lodged an FIR against 17 advocates along with Kakda under the Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act, 1984, and IPC section 447 (punishment for criminal trespass).
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