The lawyers boycotted the local courts, here on Monday on the second day of Black Flag Week, which was started on Sunday, the day when a presidential reference was filed against Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Chaudhry Muhammad Iftikhar last year.
Lawyers, political parties, citizens, labour unions and non-government organisations held a joint public meeting at Quaid-i-Azam Hall and organised protest demonstration at hunger strike camp at front of Police Station Civil lines for the reinstatement of deposed superior court judges, and for the independence of the judiciary.
Addressing the joint protest meeting, Abid Sher Ali, MNA, Khuwaja Muhammad Islam, Mian Abdul Manan, PML-(N), Sohail Irshad, senior Vice President, Shabir Ahmad Dogar, Joint Secretary, Tehrik-e-Insaf, Rai Akram Ali Kharal, District Amir, Jamiat-e-Islami Faisalabad District, Hafiz Saeed, Dr Tufail and Sattar Qureshi of Pakistan Mazdoor Kissan Party, condemned the highhandedness and tear-gas shelling by the police on the protesting lawyers and civil society members outside the Judges Colony in Islamabad, warning the caretaker government to refrain from such brutal acts in its short-lived stay in power.
They said that the caretaker government had only a few days more to live and they should refrain from employing the police against the lawyers and peaceful protestors. They added that the movement for the restoration of judges could not be suppressed through force.
They announced that all political workers and civil society members had fully participated in the Black Flag Week throughout the district. Addressing a press conference, Nasir Ali Goriaya, President, Farrukh Gulzar Awan, Secretary, District Bar Association said that the joint protest events were held in connection with the "Black Flag Week" being observed by the legal fraternity throughout the country to denounce attack on judiciary.
The other speakers, who belonged to different walks of life, pledged to continue struggle till the reinstatement of superior courts' judges, independence of judiciary, supremacy of constitution, removal of anti-media and labour laws and ouster of army role from the country's politics. They said that lawyers' movement had come out from Bar rooms and courts and now it was supported and led by students, women, labours, journalists and political parties.
They demanded of the coming elected government that all deposed judges of superior courts should be reinstated forthwith and all judges who took oath under the Provisional Constitution Order should be removed from their offices as their appointments were illegal and unconstitutional.