LAHORE, March 12: A three-hour massive traffic mess hit the city on Monday after traffic police barricaded The Mall and Lower Mall and allied arteries to stop lawyers from rallying the suspension of Iftikhar Chaudhry as chief justice of the Supreme Court.

Commuters and motorists faced a great deal of inconvenience after the closure of city’s leading roads and blamed the government and police for the traffic jam.

Police contingents were deployed at Aiwan-i-Adl, Lower Mall, Town Hall Chowk, GPO Chowk, Lahore High Court Chowk, Regal Chowk, Faisal Chowk and along The Mall.

Traffic police barricaded the roads after 11am and asked the commuters to use alternative routes. These routes already crammed with motors failed to cope with the increased flow of vehicles and long queues of vehicles were seen on the adjacent roads.

Traffic officials were helpless to cope with the emergency situation at different crossings and exchanged arguments with stuck commuters.

The closures of roads affected buses on two dozen routes.

The worst-hit sections and roads were Pir Makki shrine to Bhati Chowk, Chauburji to Lower Mall, Lakshami Chowk to Charing Cross (Faisal Chowk) and Lakshami Chowk, Mozang Road, Temple Road, Kashmir Road and Lawrence Road.

“Police blocked the traffic coming from the Punjab Assembly (Faisal Chowk), Lakshami Chowk, Anarkali and Queens roads, Chauburji, Data Ganj Bakhsh and vice versa since 11am,” said Iftikhar, an employee of a restaurant.

He said police opened the roads for traffic after 2pm when lawyers dispersed after the rain.

Khalid Ahmad, stuck in traffic jam, castigated the government and traffic managers for disturbing the traffic flow and causing inconvenience to the people.

“Lahorites already sick of daily traffic mess owing to traffic police’s failure, experienced a stunning experience of traffic jam after the closure of The Mall Road today,” he said.

City Traffic Police Chief Wasim Ahmed Khan said five special squads were deployed in addition to regular police to regulate the traffic and guide commuters on alternative routes.

POLICE DEPLOYMENT: Police reserves were called from other districts to prevent the lawyers from taking out a protest march.