September 8, 2002	Sunday	Jamadi-us-Saani29,1423

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LAHORE, Sept 7: The government took into custody top leaders of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal and hundreds of workers, thwarting their move to launch the second phase of their ‘train march’ outside the station here on Saturday.

The Khyber Mail coach that the MMA had booked to use for the march, was sealed by the police.

Of the top MMA leaders, only Allama Sajid Naqvi, chief of the newly-formed Islami Tehrik Pakistan, could reach the station. However, he was arrested as soon as he alighted from his jeep at 8am outside the station.

Jamiat Ulema-i-Pakistan chief Maulana Shah Ahmad Noorani and Jamaat-i-Islami Amir Qazi Hussain Ahmad with Liaquat Baloch and Pir Ijaz Hashmi were taken into custody near the Empress Road barricade. Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam president Maulana Fazlur Rahman was held at another barricade.

They were taken to the Sarwar Road police station.

Maulana Samiul Haq, president of his own faction of the JUI, had boarded the train from Nowshera. He was spotted at the Lahore station and the police in civvies dragged him out of the AC lower coach he was travelling in at 8:35am though he had argued that he had a ticket and thus should be allowed to continue his journey. The police action created panic among other passengers.

The MMA has called upon its workers to hold protest demonstrations outside every railway station where the alliance leaders were to be given a welcome during their Lahore-Karachi march.

Jamaat-i-Islami general secretary Syed Munawar Hassan told reporters by a cell phone from Karachi that the main demonstration would be held at the Karachi station on Sunday evening.

Police parties had besieged many Madaris in the early hours of Saturday to block transportation of party workers to the station. Many people were taken into custody and vehicles parked outside various religious schools were impounded.

Barricades manned by hundreds of anti-riot police were erected on all roads to the Lahore station, disallowing all kinds of traffic.

Every bearded person was stopped from getting to the platform even though he had a valid ticket. All such people and those who were carrying the MMA flags were taken into custody and taken to far-off places outside the city.

Police baton-charged a group of people who had gathered at a barricade at Naulakha Chowk on the Nicholson Road outside the residence of ARD president Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan.

Maulana Sami told newsmen that so far the MMA had been organizing peaceful train marches but, he feared, the government tactics might force it to adopt the path of protests.

He said the government wanted selections and not elections by holding the polls on the pattern of the April 30 referendum.

Talking to reporters by a cell phone from the police station, Maulana Noorani and Qazi Hussain Ahmad said they had the legal and constitutional right to mobilize people and added that the Election Commission rules allowed them to contact masses before polls.

Referring to their train march, they said they were to travel as ordinary passengers and tickets had been purchased and there was no illegality in that.

They said the government would not succeed in thwarting the MMA movement which would continue on streets, in localities and jails.

Answering a question, the MMA leaders said they would not boycott the elections under any circumstances.

They said that the activists who had boarded the train should go as far as they could according to the march plan.

Other leaders arrested at the station were Hafiz Mohammad Idrees, Riaz Durrani, Farid Piracha, Qari Zawwar Bahadur, Mohammad Khan Leghari, Maulana Saifuddin Saif, Maulana Khalilur Rehman Haqqani, Mian Maqsood Ahmad and Hafiz Hafeezur Rahman.

All the leaders were set free in the afternoon.

Later, the MMA leaders told a press conference at Mansoora that the government wanted to postpone the elections and it was looking for an excuse to do so. It was because of this reason that the government was trying to provoke the religious parties workers into a clash with the law-enforcement agencies personnel, they added.

“But,” they maintained, “we have frustrated the government design by keeping our workers peaceful.”

They announced that in the next phase of their mass-contact drive they would hold public meetings in all major cities.

According to the plan, the first such meeting will be held at Karachi on Sept 8, at Mingora on 12th, at Dera Ismail Khan on 20th, at Rawalpindi on 22nd, at Peshawar on 27th and at Quetta on Sept 29.

Agencies add: “It is trampling of the democratic values and the Constitution by the military dictator,” Maulana Fazl told Reuters by telephone.

At Multan, Khanewal and elsewhere in Punjab, police blocked roads to the stations to stop MMA supporters from hearing speeches by their leaders.

Police said they had arrested 32 party activists during raids on Friday night on their homes in Multan.

Punjab Home Secretary Ijaz Ahmed Shah defended the government action.

“We are doing nothing but implementing the code of conduct issued by the Chief Election Commissioner,” he told Reuters.