KHANEWAL, Nov 11: Lawyers have condemned the proposed legislation for withdrawing the power to cancel their licences from respective bar councils and transferring it to high courts.

Talking to Dawn here on Sunday, Javaid Hashmi, a Punjab Bar Council member and Pakistan People’s Party district president, termed the proposed legislation ‘black law’ for the lawyers’ community.

He said the government just wanted to suppress the lawyers and their ongoing movement for the establishment of rule of law, supremacy of the Constitution and independence of the judiciary.

Mr Hashmi claimed the PPP’s moves had energised the lawyers’ movement against the government and added that the police raids at the houses of lawyers and PPP workers were continuing unabated. He said a large number of lawyers and political activists had been arrested here after the imposition of emergency. — Correspondent