LAHORE, July 14: Lahorites accorded a warm welcome to Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry when he arrived here from Islamabad on Saturday to address the District Bar Association.

From the airport, he was taken to the district courts at the head of a huge procession consisting of hundreds of cars, wagons and motorcycles.

The motorcade of the chief justice moved towards the venue at a snail's pace as a large number of people, raising slogans and dancing to the beat of drums, lined the route.

Justice Chaudhry was to address the Bar at 6pm, but his motorcade could cover only one-third of the 25-kilometre distance when this report was filed at 11pm.

Earlier, the plane carrying Justice Chaudhry landed at 2:51pm, an hour behind schedule.

MMA leaders Liaquat Baloch and Amirul Azeem, PPP leaders Naveed Chaudhry, Samiullah Khan, Azizur Rahman Chan received him at the airport lounge.

The situation at the airport became tense when Islami Jamiat Talba activists, the student wing of Jamaat-i-Islami wearing commando shirts, raised slogans against the PPP for holding talks with the government for a deal.

The slogans enraged PPP workers, who started chanting slogans in favour of party chairperson Benazir Bhutto.

A contingent of woman police force deployed at the airport retreated from the venue, fearing a brawl between the activists of the two parties. Some senior lawyers, however, brought the situation under control.

At the venue for the reception, LBA President Syed Mohammad Shah told Dawn that seating arrangements for 10,000 guests had been made.

Mr Shah said that Lahore High Court judges had not been invited because they were on summer vacations.

Speaking at a reception camp set up at Cantonment Courts, the CJ’s counsel, Aitzaz Ahsan, said that after the restoration of the Chief Justice, political parties and lawyers’ community would draft a new social contract to address problems of the masses.