ISLAMABAD, March 21: Hundreds of lawyers who had gathered for a third time outside the Supreme Court on Wednesday to protest against the “suspension” of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry kept themselves at a distance from the political parties during their peaceful demonstration.

The lawyers made a ‘human wall’ around their procession which took off at Jinnah Avenue and concluded outside the SC.

“We think the lawyers’ movement and the political parties’ campaign against the CJ’s ‘suspension’ should be separated,” senior lawyer Hamid Khan, who is defending Justice Chaudhry with other lawyers before the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC), told Dawn.

He said the lawyers did not want to hold a joint protest with politicians and for that reason they had kept themselves away from the political groups outside the SC building.

The opposition parties were also seen holding separate rallies and public meetings outside the SC. The rally of the People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP), led by its vice-chairman Yousaf Raza Gillani, reached the SC from the party’s central secretariat. The activists and leaders of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA), led by Qazi Hussain Ahmed, came from the Parliament Lodges.

The MMA leaders held their rally outside the gate of the SC building. Similarly, the workers and leaders of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz held a separate public meeting under the leadership of party chairman Raja Zafarul Haq.

No tear gas shell was fired and no baton-charge was seen, giving a huge contrast between the situation on Wednesday and that of Friday when security personnel resorted to heavy tear-gas shelling and batons to disperse the agitated protesters.

Except one incident of a skirmish between the police and political workers, the overall situation remained peaceful on Wednesday. Timely intervention of senior officials of the local administration averted a clash between the security personnel and the protesters.

Tension developed early in the morning near the Parliament House when dozens of workers of political parties were stopped by police from proceeding towards the SC.

Heavy contingents of capital police, Rangers and Punjab police were seen at different points in the vicinity of the SC and outside it with weapons and armoured vehicles.

Barricades and rings of barbed wire had been erected on all the ways leading to the Constitution Avenue.

Protest rallies were also held in other cities throughout the country.