Daily Times

As a rift between Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) and the coalition government continues over the ongoing digital census, the party has sought resignations from its members of national and provincial assemblies and Senate, a private news channel reported on Tuesday.

The report quoting sources privy to the development, said the party has reservations over the procedure of the census in Karachi and Hyderabad.

In January, MQM-P Convener Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui iterated that his party had withdrawn a contract of saving and forming governments in their bid to break away from the conventional tactics to pressurise governments. “Streets are our house [assembly]. Now, we will settle and build it,” he added. Dr Siddiqui’s comments came during a presser held to rejoice over the “low turnout” in local government polls earlier this year, which it termed “rigged” in the Karachi and Hyderabad divisions.

The party was against conducting local body elections in the two divisions until new delimitation was done and had also threatened to quit the coalition government. Meanwhile, the party has shared serious objections over census figures so far in a meeting held with members of its Coordination Committee -commonly known as Rabita Committee. “The Rabita Committee expressed concerns over the non-serious attitude of rulers regarding the census,” the party spokesperson said in a statement.

In the meeting, presided by Dr Siddiqui, the party members discussed inaccurate statistics despite conducting meetings with ministers and relevant authorities, and presenting evidence against irregularities. The MQM-P has been insistently against the ongoing first digital census – which is the seventh national census in the country – in Karachi and Hyderabad, largely sharing its concerns over Sindh government employees executing the task.

The party has, since the census began, demanded a fresh census conducted by an impartial and private sector company. Last month, senior party leader Farooq Sattar said that MQM-P’s doubts were true after Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) chief statistician Dr Naeem Uz Zafar commented on Karachi’s population. The former Karachi mayor was of the view that the Sindh population of urban areas is being shown less and in rural areas, it is being shown more than the actual figures by the census authorities. Dr Sattar feared that Karachi’s population would be shown 66% less than its actual head count.