KARACHI, Aug 25: A scuffle among rival groups of lawyers broke up a general body meeting of the Sindh High Court Association on Monday.

SHCBA Secretary Munirur Rehman started the proceedings at 10-40am to mark the commencement of the new round of agitation announced by the Lawyers Co-ordination Committee.

Speaking first, Sindh Bar Council member Salahuddin Khan Gandapur said the feudal forces were once again out to advance the imperialist agenda and that the non-restoration of the deposed judges was part of the deal that brought them to the helm. However, the masses would crush all such forces.

Speaking next, Karachi Bar Association President Mahmudul Hasan said the declaration that agreements could be ignored had fully exposed the new rulers. The PPP occupied the front seat in the pro-judiciary struggle on March 12, 2007, through Advocates Aitzaz Ahsan and Zamarrud Khan only to weaken the (defunct) regime to extract more and more concessions for its leaders. Two other PPP lawyers, Federal Law Minister Farooq H. Naek and Attorney-General Latif Khan Khosa, were now leading the charge against the lawyers’ movement.

Pakistan Bar Council member Yasin Khan Azad demanded the floor at this stage to explain his position vis-à-vis removal of SHCBA President Rashid A. Razvi as the chairman of the PBC executive committee and his own election to the office. A number of lawyers opposed Mr Azad’s plea, saying that the Bar’s platform was available only to the lawyers who supported the reinstatement of the deposed judges.

Secretary Munirur Rehman and managing committee member Khalid Hameed said Mr Azad should not have waited for an SHCBA general body meeting to explain his position. Mr Razvi still had four months to serve as PBC executive committee chairman but was replaced at the behest of Mr Naek and Mr Khosa. Advocate Shakeel Ahmed said Mr Ahsan supported Mr Asif Ali Zardari’s candidature as the president of Pakistan in his capacity as a member of the PPP executive committee and simultaneously announced the launching of a new round of struggle as the Supreme Court Bar Association president.

Mr Azad said he only wanted to clarify that the government had nothing to do with his election as the PBC executive chairman. A motion of no-confidence against Mr Razvi and election of a new chairman was on the agenda of the PBC meeting and he was elected with 15 votes in his favour to three against. The arguments and counter-arguments were soon drowned in the din of slogans followed by a short scuffle.

Addressing a press conference later in the afternoon, Mr Razvi said the SHCBA, the KBA and the Malir Bar Association would jointly stage a two-hour sit-in on MA Jinnah Road from 2pm to 4pm on August 28. He said human rights and political activists, traders, workers and students would participate in the protest. He urged the members of civil society to join in the protest, for it was not for their personal or professional interest that the lawyers were striving. They were engaged in a battle for national survival.

The SHCBA chief pointed out that the army was there in its full strength in 1971 but the country was dismembered because there were no constitutional organs or institutions. Howsoever strong the president or the prime minister may become, they would not be able to strengthen the country in the absence of strong and vigorous civil institution, he warned.

About his removal from the chairmanship of the Pakistan Bar Council executive committee, he said it was part of a conspiracy. He challenged the federal law minister and the attorney-general to contest elections against him or any active member of the lawyers’ movement from any professional organization of the legal fraternity if they really wished to test their popularity or wanted to ascertain the lawyers’ support to the cause of the restoration of an independent judiciary.