MULTAN, Jan 7 Lawyers of Multan are opposing the demand of attaching Lodhran district with the Lahore High Court's Bahawalpur Bench after detaching it from Multan Bench.

A lawyer from Dunyapur tehsil of Lodhran district claims that 90 per cent of his bar members also opposed the detachment.

Lawyers from Lodhran are demanding detachment as Multan was far away from the district headquarters as compared to Bahawalpur. The demand got highlighted during a recent visit of Lahore High Court Chief Justice Khwaja Muhammad Sharif to Bahawalpur and lately to Multan District Bar Association (DBA) on Saturday.

According to sources, a delegation of lawyers from Lodhran met the chief justice and repeated their request for the detachment, but the demand was opposed by the lawyers of Multan. The chief justice suggested that applicants could opt for either Multan or Bahawalpur Bench, but both the groups did not agree to the suggestion.

Talking to Dawn, Lahore High Court Bar Association (Multan Bench) president Qamarul Zaman Butt said Lodhran district had cultural, business and social relations with Multan and was administratively a part of Multan division.

He said determining the territorial jurisdiction of benches on the basis of distances would create confusion as Jhang was only 160 kilometre away from Multan and 400 kilometre from Lahore, but it was attached with principal seat (Lahore).

He said when the state of Bahawalpur was being included in Pakistan, it was decided that its boundaries would not be changed for at least 100 years and attaching Lodhran with Bahawalpur Bench would be in itself an illegality.

He said the move was likely to sabotage unity among lawyers which was the need of the hour.

Lahore High Court Bar Association (Bahawalpur Bench) president Sharif Bhatti said though Bahawalpur bar was not a party to the issue, representatives of Lodhran and Kehror Pacca bars had sought their help in the matter and he had discussed the issue with the chief justice during his last visit to Bahawalpur.

He said the issue should be tackled on humanitarian grounds as the people of Lodhran were suffering due to its attachment with the Multan Bench.

Multan DBA president Mumtaz Noor Tangra called the demand a conspiracy to end the entity of Multan Bench, saying that detachment of Okara and Pakpattan districts had already eroded the territorial jurisdiction of the bench.

He said Dunyapur and Kehror Pacca were also part of Lodhran district, but its attachment with Bahawalpur Bench would cause inconvenience to the people of these two tehsils as Bahawalpur was far away from both tehsil headquarters as compared to Multan.

He said allowing applicants to choose the bench of their own wish would also create problems.