Restoration of assembly seat: LHC seeks replies from PA speaker, deputy speaker

The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Wednesday sought replies from Punjab Assembly Speaker, Deputy Speaker and Secretary till August 10 in a petition of former PML-N MPA Shumaila Rana seeking restoration of her assembly seat. She resigned in July 2009 owing to party pressure after a case of credit card theft and misuse.
On Wednesday, the former parliamentarian also filed her amended petition contending that after the registration of the case a committee was formed by PML-N comprising Senator Pervez Rashid, MNA Pervez Malik, Muhammad Ajmal, Secretary to Chief Minister and Naseem Sadiq, additional secretary law.
She also made party to three PML-N parliamentarians Khawaja Saad Rafique, Zulfiqar Khosa, Raja Ashfaq Sarwar, saying they always remained present on every sessions of the said committee. She alleged that these leaders harassed her for resigning from the seat of MPA and they also sent armed person to her house to pressurise her. Subsequently, she resigned from the assembly, the petitioner added.
Shumaila amended her petition following court's direction, as she had not mentioned the names of PML-N leaders, to whom she accused of harassing and pressurising to tender resignation. She further said the credit card theft case against her was concocted and baseless but media and opposition political parties built such an atmosphere against her, which was against her liberty and movement. She said some of her party members put so much pressure on her that she was compelled to draft her resignation.
One of the PML-N politicians grabbed the resignation by force from her and gave it to the speaker of the Punjab Assembly. Above all, she said, the speaker accepted her resignation, which she never gave him. She said the speaker committed illegality by accepting her resignation as he did not adopt legal procedure while accepting her resignation.
She said on March 1, 2010 she was acquitted from the charges by the court of law. She prayed the court that acceptance of her notification be declared as illegal. She said the notification issued by Punjab election commission to de-notify her as MPA also be declared as illegal and the respondents be directed to notify her as MPA.