LAHORE, Sept 10: The Lahore High Court building issue took a new turn on Friday when the National College of Arts' students and rights' activists staged a demonstration against the demolition work which was suspended for three days.

Carrying placards and yelling slogans, about 50 NCA students along with their teachers, noted architects and human and cultural rights' activists demonstrated on the Turner Road, along the high court building, at a time when a meeting of the LHCBA former presidents' committee was in progress.

The bar association later decided to seek an expert opinion of architects and art historians by Sept 14 and then interact with chief justice Iftikhar Husain Chaudhry and a two-member LHC construction committee, comprising Justice Mian Saqib Nisar and Justice Asif Saeed Khan Khosa.

The demonstration was also joined by several noted architects, including Nayyar Ali Dada, Khwaja Zaheeruddin, Institute of Architects' Lahore president Imrana Tiwana, human rights' activists Asma Jahangir and Shahtaj Qizalbash.

Asked about the efforts of the Institute of Architects of Pakistan's meeting with the chief justice, Imrana Tiwana told Dawn that it could not succeed despite an effort of three days. She said she contacted the LHC registrar for a meeting with the chief justice, but he did not respond.

The demonstration, she said, was held as the last resort because the IAP was denied an interview with the chief justice to express its concern about the demolition of the building.

Answering a question, she said the IAP took about a month to take notice of the issue because the project had come to her knowledge only recently. It was after the demonstration that the LHCBA decided to associate some of the experts in its efforts to preserve the original architecture of the LHC building. The LHCBA allowed some of them to join the meeting, which was chaired by Ahmad Awais.

The IAP and other experts told the meeting that they wanted the building to be preserved and restored instead of changing its structure.A delegation of the LHCBA later met the LHC construction committee and, according to Mr Awais, both Justice Mian Saqib and Justice Asif shared the concern of lawyers and others and assured the delegation that the project sought to bring changes into the building's interior while its facade would be preserved according to its original architecture.