ISLAMABAD, Oct 13: Lawyers on Monday started their long march from Lahore to Rawalpindi to protest against the constitutional amendments effected through the Legal Framework Order.

The lawyers plan to hold a convention in the Supreme Court Bar’s offices in the Supreme Court building on Tuesday.

The Supreme Court administration, however, has made arrangements to thwart their bid to enter the SC building.

An announcement by the Supreme Court’s Registrar said that nobody would be allowed to hold a convention inside the SC building. Lawyers’ entry into the court building would be restricted, and only those holding valid passes from the SC office would be allowed entry.

The lawyers from all over the country, led by Hamid Khan, the president of Supreme Court Bar Association, reached the Rawalpindi District Bar Association offices at 5.30pm and held a protest meeting there.

It was decided that the lawyers would go to the Supreme Court in Islamabad on Tuesday.

Addressing the participants of the meeting, Hamid Khan said the lawyers of the country had rejected all the so-called amendments to the Constitution through the LFO, and saw them as attempts at subverting the Constitution.

He said the lawyers community had rejected what he called the “farcical referendum” of April 30, 2002, and demanded presidential elections as prescribed by the Constitution.

The lawyers of the country, he said, wanted the revival of the Constitution as it stood at the time of the military takeover on Oct 12, 1999.