The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Friday dismissed a petition challenging the Punjab government’s plan to hold a 10-day Basant festival in 2027 after the petitioner failed to satisfy the court about the petition’s maintainability.
Justice Shehram Sarwar Chaudhry heard the petition filed by citizen Shahid Islam, who challenged the government’s plan to hold the festival from Jan 29 to Feb 7, 2027.
During the hearing, the judge questioned the petitioner’s counsel about the basis for challenging the proposed festival in the absence of a formal government notification.
The counsel told the court that the petitioner had obtained information about the proposed festival from the government’s website and newspaper reports.
Justice Chaudhry observed that the petitioner could not base the challenge on unverified information. He directed the counsel to obtain the official notification before challenging the government’s decision and said that the petitioner could seek a certified copy under the right to information law.
The judge also summoned the additional registrar (judicial) to explain why the court’s scrutiny process had not raised an objection to the petition.
When the petitioner’s counsel referred to the previous ban on Basant and alleged deaths reported during last year’s festival, Justice Chaudhry directed him to restrict his arguments to the relevant legal provisions.
The judge also expressed concern over the petitioner repeatedly interrupting the proceedings despite having a lawyer representing him.
The judge dismissed the petition after the petitioner withdrew it.
The petitioner had named several government officials and departments as respondents, including the Punjab chief secretary, home secretary, Lahore deputy commissioner, inspector general of police and Lahore capital city police officer.
