LAHORE: Lahore High Court (LHC) told the PTI not to hold a rally this Sunday at Iqbal Park. Court urged PTI to let people go about their normal lives.
The party was going to hold a “historic” public rally at Lahore’s Minar-e-Pakistan on March 19. PTI Chairman Imran Khan was going to lead the rally.
Fawad Chaudhry had asked the high court to stop the police operation in the Zaman Park area the day before. As the court had ordered, the police went after Khan in the Toshakhana case.
After the first hearing, the high court told the police to stop the operation until 10 a.m. today. This helped calm the situation at the former prime minister’s home, which had turned into a battleground.
But when the hearing started up again today, Justice Tariq Saleem Sheikh said that neither the LHC nor the Islamabad High Court (IHC) had stopped the police from carrying out the arrest warrants for the former prime minister.
The court said that the “order passed yesterday” should be followed until the next hearing, which is tomorrow. This means that Zaman Park can’t be used until tomorrow.
Law enforcement officers and PTI workers fought for almost 24 hours as they tried to get through the party members to arrest Khan, who was voted out as prime minister in April.
During the process, a lot of people got hurt, mostly police officers, because law enforcement used tear gas and party supporters threw Molotov cocktails.
Khan has been in court since early last year, when he was kicked out of office by a vote in parliament. Since then, he has held protests across the country calling for a quick election. During one of these events, he was shot and hurt.