** This post was originally published on FASTRising Official blog on March, 19th, 2009. **

The short version, by our in-house wit: An idea whose time has come cannot be contained – nor container-ed.
The spiel:
While the nation celebrates and the most pessimistic activists are in wait-and-see mode till the 22nd of March, it behooves us to do a tally.
Some positives:

At the national level, a large number of people have finally seen a practical demonstration of the effectiveness of popular power in a democratic setup – however young and weak our …

A personal account of Youm-e-Fatah : 16th March 2009.

CJP at the Lahore airport lounge [Photo Courtesy: ARYOne World
Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry reached Lahore on Saturday noon to administer the oath of newly elected members of Lahore district bar and address a convention of lawyers. His flight landed around 12 in the noon at Lahore airport where President Supreme Court Bar Ali Ahmad Kurd, Chaudhry Atizaz Ahsan, deposed judge Khalil Ramday and large number of lawyers, civil society activists, students and workers of PML-N, Jamaat-i-Islami, Tahreek-i-Insaaf and other political parties received him.

Earlier, large number of lawyers …

Following is an email from Aitzaz Ahsan, leader of the Lawyer’s movement where he clarifies his position, his relation with the movement and his reasoning.

Aitzaz Ahsan : right or wrong ?

My dear Samad,
I opened your mail yesterday and was deeply pained by it and by its tenor.
Of late there is a veritable campaign being fostered on the net and many mails are targeting the leadership of the Lawyers Movement. There is no doubt that most of the criticism is pointed at me but the beauty of …

Advocate Faisal Siddiqi discusses the achievements and challenges of the Lawyer’s movement in this interesting article. He divides the movement into four phases: First [March 9th, 2007 - July 20th, 2007],
Second [July 21st, 2007 - November 2nd, 2007], Third [November 3rd, 2007 - February 17th, 2008] and
Fourth  [February 18th, 2008 - August 27th, 2008] and narrates the historic achievements and the challenges that the movement faces.

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Photos:

I could not take better pictures for not getting any chance to have good enough space and for the reason that the cops were not allowing to move to a better place for shooting pictures.
View album here.
Videos:
Just gained an energy boost after having heavy meals and red bull. I present the exclusive videos of the CJP’s reception at Lahore. A historic event indeed. Please bear with the poor video quality and the moving frames – this was the best possible in such circumstances. I wish I had a HD camera.

Before …

Photos:

I could not take better pictures for not getting any chance to have good enough space and for the reason that the cops were not allowing to move to a better place for shooting pictures.
View album here.
Videos:
Just gained an energy boost after having heavy meals and red bull. I present the exclusive videos of the CJP’s reception at Lahore. A historic event indeed. Please bear with the poor video quality and the moving frames – this was the best possible in such circumstances. I wish I had a HD camera.

Before …

I just returned from the rally which started from the Lahore airport. We received the CJP around 5:45 PM and I remained in the rally that followed his car till 8:30 PM. When I left, the rally had hardly traveled 1 KM from the airport exit. Lahore is completely choked, it took me around two and a half hours to get back home when normally it takes just half an hour. The path I followed was completely opposite to the route of the rally and had nothing to do with …

IJT a.k.a Jamiat, the student wing of JI, attacked the pro-Judiciary camp setup by SAC and FASTRising at Nasir bagh, Lahore for the promotion of the Long march. Detailed report available here.
The organizers of the camp were harassed, beaten up and forced to move away. The attackers torn off the posters and flex banenrs at the camp pressurizing those at the camp to leave immediately. Ahmed Saleemi, one of the SAC members was beaten up while I was forced to move away when I tried to reach the camp.

The camp …

For those who want to join the students on the long March, here is the schedule which FASTRising and SAC will follow. The schedule is provisional, however.
12th June 9 – 11 AM :
- Check-in in front of Aitzaz’s House.
- Please eat a heavy breakfast as we have a long day ahead of us.
12th June 11 AM :
- Buses leave for High Court to join lawyers.
- CJ’s address at the High Court.
12th June 12 PM (estimate)
- Leave for Islamabad via GT Road
- SAC bus will follow CCP delegation.
12th June …