The delay was caused by two factors: the state created all kinds of hurdles to keep swarms of people from coming on to the Grand Trunk Road to see or touch Justice Chaudhry. The people have made an eloquent and decisive political statement: they have vindicated the CJP and sided with what the CJP, on forced leave, stands for.

The regime is shrill: these lawyers are politicizing a purely legal or judicial issue while the subject is sub judice. But what is sub judice? SJC and the Supreme Court have to determine the truth or otherwise of specific charges contained in the Presidential Reference of March 9.

Who cares about the truth or falsehood of those charges? For the legal fraternity and the people, the question at issue now is different and strictly political: Is the country's executive authority supreme, and can it order the judiciary around (and parliaments and media)?

As for the truth or otherwise of what Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry has been impugned for, well, the SJC and SCP will decide. The writer, or anyone else, has no business to comment; none is being offered here. But it is fair to say that Justice Chaudhry has objected to certain judges, all junior to him, who should not sit on judgement on him due to perceived bias. What is extraordinary but relevant is the political background.

Now, the exciting cause of all this was the shabby way in which Justice Chaudhry was treated on March 9 in the Army House, and which was seen in the perspective of the last 43 years' history of the supremacy of army over the judiciary.

The perspective includes the known, and highly controversial, political plans of the army chief, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, to go on being army chief and the president till 2012 by getting himself elected from the existing assemblies that are scheduled to go home next November -- depriving the incoming new assemblies of the right to elect the president.

Meantime, there was also the question of the quality of the polls under the existing distribution of powers, and the way the polls are likely to be held. The people and many lawyers want the upcoming polls to be transparently free -- not like the doctored polls of 2002.

Also in General Musharraf's perspective, Justice Chaudhry must have appeared like to him. Why? Because of a large number of constitutional petitions challenging various aspects of that and other polls, after the election of the president.

Justice Chaudhry could not be relied upon to side with the general. Which is why a campaign of character assassination against Justice Chaudhry was inspired in Feb last with a view to forcing him to resign. Iftikhar Chaudhry, unexpectedly, refused to do so silently like some others.

Before the apex court and SJC came into the picture, these events and their preparations were pure politics by the regime. Justice Chaudhry's refusal to oblige the regime has opened a new chapter of resistance by the judiciary and the legal profession to the military's right to call all the shots.

What had hitherto happened was a continuously decisive political role of the military since 1953, and its ritual validation by the apex Court under the infamous doctrine of "state necessity." All military dictators, including those who ruled from behind the scenes from 1988 to 1999, enjoyed the judiciary's obedient "approval."

Justice Chaudhry is the first CJP who had the guts to disobey the army chief. That act of moral courage touched the deepest chords in Pakistanis' hearts and has caught their imagination. Hence May 5's and 6's exciting and uplifting events.

The legal profession and the people are only secondarily interested in the person of Mr. Iftikhar Chaudhry; the main thrust of their campaign is the supremacy of law over all organs of state, which means having a non-controversial Constitution as the supreme law from which all laws are to flow.

The superior judiciary should ensure that the Constitution is obeyed by all organs of state. That is the foundation of democracy, which is all about human rights of all citizens, as equals, to be ensured by a free judiciary.

The point about the grand spectacles of this May 5 and 6 is the start of a New Pakistan Movement -- for a New Pakistan that will be a simple democracy (without adjectives) where everything will be done according to the Constitution and where the judiciary, and indeed the whole legal fraternity, are the guardian of the Constitution in cooperation with all citizens.

The military is a necessary department of the government. But it must be made accountable to the people and the state through close parliamentary oversight -- quite like the bureaucracy. To repeat, May 5 and 6 are only a beginning. Now onward, it is incumbent on political parties, TUs, Academia and NGOs, to take up the torch and move forward.

Let there be no cobwebs about democracy. It is not a rule by angels, clerics or Plato-like philosophers. Any parliament has to reflect the society that elected it. Elections must be free and fair. The society, its organs of the government, media, big business and other special interest groups, must accept the Constitution and the Judiciary as umpires.

Democracy's distinguishing mark is actually enjoyed freedoms by all citizens, and dispensation of justice to all. Without this, democracy is often an unclean, noisy and disorderly affair.

Its virtues are three: it sets all citizens free; and secondly provides peaceful and orderly succession of rulers. The third virtue, needless to say, is the rule of law and independence of the judiciary, instead of tin pot dictators.

The task right now is to resolve this judicial crisis. The simplest way is for Gen. Musharraf to heed the advice of his predecessor in the Army House: withdraw the reference and reinstate the CJP. One realizes that human pride and prejudice, not to mention ambition and self-interest, may stand in the way. That advice may not prove palatable. But then, the alternative is his dangerous struggle with what has now emerged as the will of the people.

Let no sycophants misguide the army chief that all this hullabaloo is for the sake of Mr. Chaudhry alone. The matter is no longer about one man; even Mr. Chaudhry now has no control over what he has helped launch. It is now the people's movement for the supremacy of law and Constitution; it will be hard even for apex court judges to disregard what is a powerful -- maybe fateful -- signal.

Another immediate issue is the forthcoming elections for National and Provincial Assemblies: how they can be made transparently free. Intelligence agencies have to be brought under effective legislative and judicial control. The mechanics of holding the presidential polls also will then fall into place.

Let no one miss the high significance of last Saturday and Sunday's events. People of Punjab have done Pakistan proud; Pakistan is stronger today because of this inspiring spectacle, and will go on becoming stronger if this New Pakistan Movement is not thwarted or betrayed by the disunity of parties. From now on it is for the civil society to take it forward. Failure in this task may hurt Pakistan irreparably.

MB Naqvi is a leading Pakistani columnist.