Sindh High Court on Tuesday issued notices to provincial Home Department and Inspector General of Police in a plea, challenging the home department's notification that restricted Youm-e-Ali processions in view of Corona virus pandemic.
A division bench of the SHC headed by Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar ordered Home Department, IG Sindh and others to submit their replies by May 13, 2020.
Petitioner Agha Haider Ali submitted that restricting religious activities was against the law, insisting that the government should define standard operating procedures for the processions as has been done for mosques as well.
Justice Mazhar asked about any SOPs regarding Youm-e-Ali, at which Additional Advocate General Sindh Jawad Dero told the court that the federal government defined SOPs about mosques, however didn't know about such SOPs for procession.
Justice Mazhar said that the religious leaders of all sects should have been invited in the meeting on SOPs, presided over by President of Pakistan.
The bench asked the petitioner to give the copy of a petition to the government attorney and stated that the government would look into the matter once the reply of provincial government was received.
The petitioner requested the court to direct the government to devise SOPs for the procession as it did for mosques and maintained that processions would follow SOPs if devised by the government.
The petitioner requested the court to allow processions on Ramazan 17, 18 and 21 by nullifying the notification of Home Department to ban processions.
Comments
Comments are closed.