LAHORE - Eight PCO judges of the Lahore High Court on Thursday resigned from their offices and sent it to LHC Registrars office to be forwarded to the President of Pakistan. The judges who have resigned include Justice Mian Najamuz Zaman, Justice Maulvi Anwarul Haq, Justice Muhammad Khalid Alvi, Justice Syed Sakhi Hussain Bokhari, Justice M Bilal Khan, Justice Fazale Miran Chauhan, Justice Tariq Shamim and Justice Syed Asghar Haider. In view of July-31 judgement of Supreme Court, the judges seek pre-mature retirement under Article 195 of the Constitution, the text of resignation said. As there is no mentioning of phrase pre-mature retirement in Article 195, hence these judges have actually tried to play with words by writing pre-mature retirement instead of resignation, a legal expert said. The sources said the LHCs Registrar has forwarded resignations to the President of Pakistan for acceptance. These judges were perturbed over July 31 decision and subsequently issuance of contempt of court notices to them while hearing review petitions against July-31 verdict. These judges finally took the decision in a meeting held on Wednesday. They also called on LHC Chief Justice on the same day. Supreme Court 14 member bench had issued contempt of court notices to all judges - both serving and retired- who opted to take oath under Provisional Constitutional Order on November 3, 2007. The Supreme Court is of the view that these judges have violated its seven-member judges judgement of scrapping the PCO on the same day. Sources said these eight judges have sought early retirement to get after retirement benefits that under the rules are given to judges who had served as a judge at least for five years. However they will still face contempt of court proceedings because SC had issued notices to all judges including retired ones. The move, however, would save these judges facing Supreme Judicial Council, which is not constitutionally empowered to proceed against retired judges. Five out of these eight judges would be able to get after retirement benefits. They include, Justice Najamuz Zaman, Maulvi Anwarul Haq, Khalid Alvi, Sakhi Hussain Bokahri and Justice M Bilal Khan. Four PCO judges are still on the strength of LHC, which has considerably reduced to 24. They are Justice Syed Shabbar Raza Rizvi, Syed Hamid Ali Shah, Justice Syed Sajjad Hussain Shah and Justice Hasnat Ahmed Khan. Interestingly, none of these four judges have been included in roster issued for next week commencing on October 12 as they have proceeded on leave.