Ghaziabad, Dec 6 (IANS): Lawyers here Saturday boycotted the Rashtriya Lok Adalat being organised in each district court following the Supreme Court's directives.

The bar association announced the boycott to press their old demand for setting up a Bench of the Allahabad High Court in western Uttar Pradesh.

Bar association president Anil Pandit said western UP lawyers have been demanding the Bench for 34 years but all governments have ignored it.

Calling it criminal apathy, Pandit said litigants from 22 districts are subjected to loot at Allahabad.

The committee at Meerut decided to boycott the proceedings of the Rashtriya Lok Adalat at the district-level in all 22 districts of western Uttar Pradesh.

Like other districts in western UP, the Ghaziabad Bar Association also boycotted the courts. All the entry gates leading to civil courts were locked. No litigants were allowed to attend the courts, Pandit said.

They were convinced by teams of lawyers and the litigants agreed to cooperate with the lawyers call of total strike Saturday, he added.

Law Minister D. V. Sadananda Gowda had agreed to establish a bench of the Allahabad High Court in western Uttar Pradesh after a delegation of three ministers -- General (Retd.) V.K. Singh, Sanjeev Baliyan, and Mahesh Sharma and several MPs from Meerut, Bulandshahr and other adjoining districts along with lawyers had met him Dec 1, Pandit said.