LAHORE, Nov 27: The Lahore High Court’s registrar office on Tuesday put objections to two identical civil miscellaneous applications filed by social activists to become a necessary party in a pending matter about naming Chaudhry Rehmat Ali Chowk (Shadman’s Fawara Chowk) after Bhagat Singh.
Dr Taimur Rehman and Diep Saeeda filed these applications through Advocate Yasir Latif Hamdani.
The office objected to the locus standi of the applicants who submitted that a frivolous impression was created by the petitioner organisation (Tehrik-i-Hurmat-e-Rasool) in the case that the decision to rename Fawara Chowk after a freedom fighter was a conspiracy against Pakistan.
The applicants stated that the renaming of Shadman Chowk after Bhagat Singh was a supreme act of patriotism in fact. They said Pakistan is a Muslim country where people respect and cherish the Holy Prophet (Peace be upon him).
They said the petitioner had no locus standi in the matter as Bhagat Singh, the freedom fighter, was known to hold no animosity towards Islam or our Holy Prophet (Peace be upon him).
They pleaded that Bhagat Singh was a non-communal freedom fighter who stood for the independence of the subcontinent from British imperialism for all people of the region, including the Muslims.
The applicants said the petitioner was incensed at the suggestion of renaming the Chowk earlier named after Chaudhry Rehmat Ali, who in his writings roundly abused and attacked Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah.
They said it was true that Chaudhry Rehmat Ali came up with the name of the new country but it was also well known that he distanced himself from Pakistan after its creation in 1947 and choose to live the rest of his life in England and wrote abusivetomes against the Quaid-i-Azam and the Muslim League.
They further said the city district government’s decision to rename the Chowk was a case of legitimate exercise of executive authority which could not be impugned and was certainly not anti-Pakistan or anti-Islam by any stretch of imagination.
The applicants, therefore, prayed to the court to make them necessary and proper parties to the pending litigation.