Gun attack on Indian professor

Mr Geelani was acquitted in 2003

A Delhi university professor, who was acquitted of being involved in an attack on India's parliament in 2001, is in hospital after being shot.

Syed Abdul Rahman Geelani, a Kashmiri, was attacked by unidentified gunmen on Tuesday night in the Indian capital.

Doctors performed surgery on Mr Geelani who is said to have received at least three bullet wounds.

In 2003 a Delhi court overturned the conviction of Mr Geelani in connection with the parliament attack.

The Press Trust of India reports that Mr Geelani's condition has improved following the surgery.

India's Supreme Court has described the incident as "disturbing" and has asked Delhi police to submit a report to it on the attack within a week. Police deny any involvement in the shooting.

They have launched an investigation into the attack, which took place when he was visiting his lawyer.

"I heard some loud gunshots and then heard him banging on the door," his lawyer, Nandita Haksar, said.

"When I came out he was clutching his stomach and said he had been shot."

Conviction overruled

Mr Geelani, who spent nearly two years in jail, had been sentenced to death under a tough new anti-terrorism law for what the prosecution described as his role in planning a deadly attack on the Indian parliament in 2001.

Fourteen people died, including the five gunmen, in the attack

Fourteen people, including the five gunmen who carried out the shooting, died in the attack.

Two years later the decision was overturned by the Delhi high court which ruled that the prosecution's evidence against him and another person similarly charged was insufficient.

The conviction of two others were upheld but India's Supreme Court has halted their execution until their appeals are heard in court.

The attack on India's parliament led to a serious breach in relations between India and Pakistan with Delhi blaming Islamabad for being behind the attack.

Pakistan denied having to do anything with it but the crisis brought both nuclear-rivals close to an all-out war in the summer of 2002.

Since then both sides have been engaged in a peace process.