Daily Times

LAHORE: Joint opposition Monday ended its five-day-long boycott of the Punjab Assembly (PA) after Speaker Rana Iqbal tendered his apology for using non-parliamentary words over the issue of quorum.

The Punjab Assembly session on Monday started one hour and 25 minutes late to its scheduled time with Speaker Rana Iqbal in the chair in the absence of opposition members.

A special delegation, comprising Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah, provincial ministers Nadeem Kamran and Ch Shafiq, held initial talks with the joint opposition at the chamber of Opposition Leader in the PA Mian Mehmoodur Rasheed and succeeded to convince the joint opposition to hold negotiations with the speakers at the latter’s chamber.

All four major opposition parties, including Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) and Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) participated in the negotiations after which the speaker agreed to tender an apology in the House for using non-parliamentary words.

Following the speaker’s apology, opposition members joined the proceedings of the House and demanded the chair to extend day for holding pre-budget discussions to ensure participation of remaining opposition members.

Earlier, the House taking advantage of the absence of the opposition, passed and amended bill regarding increasing in tuition fee of private schools from five percent to eight percent with the approval of the Registering Authority and the District Committee.

No amendment to the bill suggested by the opposition was taken up due to their boycott and the bill was passed in no time.

Prior to the start of the proceedings of the House, Rana Sanaullah held a special media talk. To a query, he said, “The government has put Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) chief Hafiz Saeed under house arrest on the allegations of delivering speeches contrary to the state’s policies.”

Referring to alleged harassment of Pashtun in Punjab, he said that the PPP and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf were politicising the issue. He said that Pashtun were enjoying more independence in Punjab as compared to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP).

He said that the military Operation Radd-ul-Fassad was not against any community. Anyhow, he confirmed that Rangers and the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) had arrested 1,371 terrorists during the combing operation while 400 suspects, including 300 Pashtun, were booked during intelligence base operations (IBOs).