ISLAMABAD: A petition was moved in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday, requesting a ban on Black Friday shopping campaigns for being “contrary to Islamic teachings”. The petitioner made the government a party through its information, religious affairs secretaries, the PEMRA chairman, district magistrate, chief commissioner and Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) chairman. Black Friday is held, particularly in the USA, to mark the start of Christmas discount sales season. “Friday has religious significance for Muslims. Therefore calling it ‘black’ is a crime,” the petitioner stated. “According to dictionary, Black Friday means ill-fated or black day. Hence, the court must ban celebration of Black Friday on November 24 in Pakistan,” the petitioner said. Separately, Advocate Azhar Siddique on Thursday wrote a letter to the president, prime minister and all provincial chief ministers to ban Black Friday celebrations and promotion of Western culture on official level. “Consumers can be facilitated under the banner of ‘Bright Friday’ instead,” he said. Earlier, the Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation (PTDC) MD Chaudhry Abdul Ghafoor had come out in the open against Black Friday. “It is disgusting that some business tycoons are bringing Friday a bad name of ‘black’ just to blindly follow the West for increasing their business. Friday is a gift for Muslims, which is a holy, blessed, and virtuous day,” he said on Wednesday. He urged Ulema and Mashayekh (Islamic clerics) to protest against “this attribute to bring false names for this holy day for personal gains of business interests”. Published in Daily Times, November 24th 2017.