Daily Times

LAHORE: The Peace Committee of the Punjab Youth Parliamentary Caucus (PYPC) – an organisation comprising 85 young legislators of the Punjab Assembly – has announced to move two bills against hate speeches and allocation of reserved seats for youth in the House, respectively.

The committee members, including MPAs Rana Manan Khan, Hina Pervez Butt, and minority representative MPA Merry Gill along with Sabiha Shaheen, head of Bargad – a non-governmental organisation – held a joint press conference here at the Lahore Press Club on Friday to brief media about their work for peace building within the Punjab Assembly.

After the press conference, they also cut a Christmas cake to enhance interfaith harmony and tolerance among different religions and schools of thoughts existing in the society. Speaking on this occasion, legislators appreciated technical assistance provided by the Bargad, and said that legislative support of the PYPC to understand and implementation of the National Action Plan (NAP) had been beneficial to parliamentarians.

It may be mentioned that the committee has been initiated to pursue implementation of the NAP and counter violent terrorism. And, the committee members in the Punjab Assembly have already filed four resolutions and seven questions in the Notice Branch of the Punjab Assembly Secretariat, besides six training workshops for parliamentarians have already been initiated by the Bargad.

Rana Manan said that establishment and work of the peace committee – having representation from treasury as well as opposition benches- was hailed as a big step for the MPAs working on peace building. He said that his party, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), was vigilant to curb hate speech material and other forms of extremism, and was implementing laws enacted to curb the menace of extremism and terrorism.

Hina Pervez Butt, who has been elected as the general secretary of the youth caucus, said that the Pakistan Army and other law enforcement forces were valiantly fighting terrorism in the country but some elements were still busy in negative manoeuvring and hate speeches. She said that it was high time that the nation and young parliamentarians support the ongoing efforts to root out much deeper issues of extremism, hate speeches and promote tolerance.

She said that they were working on a bill to restrict hate speech material in the society at every level, and it would be submitted in the Punjab Assembly soon. She also announced that youth could play a more vital role to maintain peace and harmony in the society so she would also introduce a resolution and a bill for allocation of reserved seats for them in the Punjab Assembly such as reserved seats for women.