Here they go again: Faisalabad lawyers resume strike for LHC bench demand

The break for general elections is over.

FAISALABAD:

Lawyers resumed their protest strike on Thursday to demand a Lahore High Court bench for Faisalabad division.

The lawyers, who had been protesting since January, had started working on Mondays and Tuesdays after the LHC chief justice requested them to keep their clients’ interests in mind.

They had then suspended their strike as general elections approached. Some of them had tried to stop candidates from filing their nomination papers with the returning officers. They had been stopped by district administration and police.

Addressing a press conference in April, District Bar Association president Mian Javaid Iqbal had said that the lawyers had decided to work two days a week after they were assured by the LHC CJ that their demand would be met.

He had said that their resumption of work for the two days and later during the elections should not be taken as a softening of their stance.



On Thursday, Iqbal announced resumption of the seven-day boycott of courts saying that they had been promised a bench after the elections, but the promise had not been kept. He said that the lawyers wanted to make litigation easier and cheaper for the people of the district.

He said in March the Punjab cabinet had approved the establishment of LHC benches in Faisalabad, Dera Ghazi Khan, Sahiwal, Sargodha and Gujranwala.

He said the LHC chief justice had formed a three-member committee to prepare a report on the establishment of the benches.

He said none of the committee members had visited Faisalabad. He regretted that the court’s orders had not been taken seriously.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 17^th, 2013.