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| May 12, 2005 | Thursday | Rabi-us-Sani 3, 1426 |
Action against LPG rickshaws restrained
LAHORE, May 11: Justice Mohammad Bilal Khan of the Lahore High Court on Wednesday restrained the City District Government Lahore (CDGL) from taking punitive action against rickshaws running on LPG The court served notices on the federal ministry of natural resources and the district coordination and police officers to explain in three weeks the reason for the recent crackdown on LPG rickshaws which, the court observed, seemed discriminatory in nature.
The court issued the restraining order in a petition through which the Lahore Rickshaw Drivers’ Union and the Tajir Ittehad, Lytton Road, had raised the legal question on the CDGL action against LPG rickshaws, whose number was said to be about 120,000. The government action came after gas cylinder blasts at the Iqbal Town vegetable market last week, which killed 29 people.
Contending that no fatal accident had so far been reported from anywhere in Lahore and elsewhere for using LPG cylinders, the petitioners sought a court injunction, ruling that the CDGL’s ban was unlawful and should be reversed.
Petitioners’ counsel Naseer Ahmad Bhutta submitted that the campaign against rickshaws after the blast was unwarranted and unlawful because they were mere consumers and users of LPG. If any such campaign was required it hould have been directed against LPG distributors and factories where cylinders were filled.
The counsel submitted that the CDGL was removing gas kits fitted in rickshaws, depriving rickshaw drivers of a lawful means of livelihood, which contravened Article 9 of the Constitution. He submitted that the CDGL action was also in conflict with Article 18 of the Constitution, according to which no one could be deprived of lawful business activities.
The counsel cited a Supreme Court judgment according to which stopping anyone from a lawful business amounted to playing with the life of citizens. He submitted that scores of people were earning their bread through the rickshaw and the action was a direct attack on their life.
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