A petition was filed in Lahore High Court to re-declare Iqbal Day as a Public Holiday. Allama Iqbal was born on 9th November and it was celebrated as a national holiday to pay tribute to the national poet but Interior Ministry abolished the public holiday in 2015.
In the application Federal and provincial governments were filed as respondents and as Iqbal day is approaching near it is expected that the hearing may be sought early.
Farhad Ali Shah who filed the petition said that Iqbal was the spiritual father of Pakistan. ‘He was a poet, philosopher, politician, barrister & scholar’, he added.
A similar application was filed earlier but is pending without any hearing, it is feared that the current application will also become one of the thousands of pending cases in Pakistan.