LAHORE, March 15: PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif led a large procession out of here to Islamabad on Sunday to participate in a sit-in outside parliament, defying what he termed ‘illegal’ detention orders.

Police made no attempt to bar the former prime minister from breaking cordons surrounding his Model Town residence to set out for the GPO Chowk on The Mall, the starting point of the Lahore leg of the long march to Islamabad.

Before leaving his home, Mr Sharif said he did not accept the illegal orders and vowed to continue his struggle for the restoration of the judiciary to its pre-emergency position. “We will not be scared away,” he said, calling upon the youth to come out on the streets to “support us and save me”.

As the Pakistan Muslim League-N convoy, comprising a couple of hundred party legislators and workers, marched ahead, hundreds of others waiting in nearby parks and streets joined the procession.

By the time it reached near the GPO Chowk, the procession had grown significantly large.

Thousands of people waved to Mr Sharif from their rooftops as his convoy made its way to the GPO Chowk. Demonstrators had been waiting for him for hours at the GPO Chowk, but the former prime minister left for Islamabad without addressing them.

Hundreds of people lined both sides of the road as the procession moved slowly to the city’s northern limits late in the night.

Only a day earlier, federal ministers Manzoor Wattoo, Nazar Gondal and Sardar Assef Ahmed Ali had vowed that the government would deal with the marchers with an ‘iron fist’.

But the way Mr Sharif was allowed to leave raised questions as to why police did not implement the detention orders.

Although Interior Ministry Adviser Rehman Malik told media later that the government had not issued any restraining orders or put the Sharifs under house arrest, Punjab Home Secretary Rao Iftikhar told Dawn that the provincial government had served the PML-N leader with detention orders early in the morning “under MPO 51b”.

“You better ask the police,” Mr Rao said when asked why the order was not executed. “Who cares for law in this country? He forced his way through,” the official added.

When asked if the government would try to prevent the procession from leaving the city limits, he said: “We will try to convince him not to lead the protesters in view of his own security amidst terror threats and for public safety, peace and tranquillity.”

Senior police officers were unwilling to talk on the issue.

Knowledgeable sources claimed that “some dramatic developments during the day, perhaps outside intervention, had forced the government to withdraw police and allow opposition leaders to address the rally and lead processions.

“It seems that some assurances had also been given by the PML-N for a peaceful show.”

Lawyers’ leader Aitzaz Ahsan also “escaped” from police custody to join protesting colleagues at GPO Chowk and the lawyers’ procession to Islamabad and lead their procession to Islamabad along with Anwar Kamal, a former president of the Lahore High Court Bar Association.

Mr Kamal said around 25 coaches carrying lawyers had left the city to join the convoy.

Rasul Baksh Palejo, chief of the Awami Tehrik from Sindh, also joined the lawyers in the evening and left for Islamabad with them.

Earlier in the day, opposition activists broke through barricades erected on main roads throughout the city to reach the GPO Chowk, where they engaged in fierce clashes with police, resulting in over three dozen arrests.

The activists joined some 500 lawyers who had camped at the Lahore High Court complex overnight.

Large speakers blared out lawyers’ anthems, while activists of the PML-N, Jamaat-i-Islami, Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf and Labour Party, as well as a sizeable number of un-affiliated citizens, including students, began to descend upon the intersection in small groups at around 10am.

As a surveillance helicopter flew overhead and a couple of Rangers’ vehicles drove by, the protesters chanted anti-government and pro-judiciary slogans and waved their party flags. The situation began to turn ugly around midday when police baton-charged a group of students trying to reach the area from McLeod Road.

Thereafter, hundreds of police personnel clashed with stone-throwing and stick-wielding opposition activists -- many of whom had travelled from distant towns and cities of the province -- and used teargas in an attempt to disperse the crowd.

However, the crowd managed to regroup after being pushed back several times and its number continued to swell through the afternoon.

Some JI activists had come prepared with handkerchiefs, water and salt to combat the effects of the gas. Several police vehicles, both at the GPO Chowk and around the city, were damaged by protesters and a police car was torched at Jain Mandir.

Human Rights Commission of Pakistan’s co-chairman Iqbal Haider, who is a former PPP senator, termed the crackdown “a huge shame”.

“They are following in the footsteps of Ziaul Haq and defying Shaheed Benazir Bhutto’s legacy,” he said.

Samina Noman, a lawyer who had travelled from Karachi, said: “Even before we have started, they are nervous and have started gassing us. We didn’t expect this from a democratic government.”

Teargas shelling continued for more than three hours before police finally began to break away.
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