LAHORE: The joint opposition in Punjab held a meeting here on Monday to evolve a strategy for protest on Tuesday (today) against the Orange Line Train Project.

Held at the Jamaat-i-Islami’s local office here, the moot was chaired by opposition leader in Punjab Assembly Mian Mahmoodur Rasheed.

Among the participants included PPP’s Samina Khalid Ghurki, PML-Q’s Mian Muneer, Awami Tehreek’s retired Maj Saeed and Nurullah Siddiqui, PTI’s Zaheer Abbas Khokhar and JI’s Zikrullah Mujahid.

The opposition had planned to launch a protest march from GPO Chowk up to the Chief Minister’s Secretariat on The Mall.

Talking to the media after the meeting, Mr Rasheed alleged that police were uprooting the camps set up for the people being affected by the train project, while the political activists manning the site were being harassed.

Responding to a query, he said if metro train was a public project then why it was not being processed through proper channel by presenting it before the elected representatives in the Punjab Assembly and why the citizens were afraid of it.

He counseled the rulers to change their thinking instead of the identity of Lahore and include solution to the basic problems of the masses in their priority list.

Mian Muneer said they would not allow destruction of the historical beauty of the provincial metropolis and pledged to protect the national heritage with the help of the public support.

Mrs Ghurki negated the impression that the PPP was against the joint protest and said that the participation of the Jiyalas in Tuesday’s protest would prove as false all the propaganda in this regard.

Mr Mujahid also said that the JI would never support any “anti-masses” project.

Meanwhile, the civil society has also planned to join the political parties’ protest against the metro train and has appealed to people from all walks of life to participate in it at 2pm.

Published in Dawn, February 2nd, 2016