Federal Minister for Human Rights, Mumtaz Alam Gilani has said that National Commission for Human Rights bill would be tabled in the National Assembly during its current session.
While talking to reporters at SAFMA office on the eve of World Human Rights Day here on Sunday, he said, the bill would ensure establishment of an independent HR commission to be headed by a retired judge of the Supreme Court or High Court. The Commission having its branches at provincial level would have authority to take suo motto action, he added.
Gilani said the Federal HR Ministry is going to appoint co-ordinators/HR defenders at district and divisional level with HR cells comprising journalists, lawyers, women and farmer representatives by December 10, 2010, and these cells would monitor the human rights implementation.
In respond to a question, he said the Federal Ministry for Human Rights has chalked a ten day HR awareness programme in different parts of the country including Sukkur, Rahim Yar Khan, Larkana, Quetta, Haripur and Islamabad etc.
He further said that human rights record during this year had not been satisfactory, as people are fast loosing tolerance due to economic constraints as well as flood calamity, which exposed 20 million individuals to the open
sky. When asked, he said, the relevant parliamentary committee was reviewing the blasphemy laws especially their implementation procedures so as to avoid its misuse in order to maintain harmony among people belonging to different faiths in the country. An SP rank police officer should register the blasphemy case and it should be investigated by a body comprising representatives from Muslim and non-Muslim communities, he added.
Mumtaz Alam Gilani expressed his concerns over the poor law and order situation in Punjab, where police high-handedness, dacoity incidents and other crimes are on the rise, while, the PML-N led government had failed to deliver any good to the general public. Punjab Chief Minister, he added, had left affairs of all the departments at the helm of N-Leaguers, which further deteriorated the situation regarding sugar crises, price-hike, health, dispensation of justice and other social matters.
In reply to a question, Gilani said, the PPP ministers in the Punjab government are rendered powerless and they don't have the authority to transfer even a peon of their respective departments, and they were not being allowed to work for welfare and betterment of the masses he said, adding, the PPP would not tolerate such attitude any more for the sack of people, who are the PPP's strength. The Federal Minister for Human Rights resolved that PPP led government was committed to transform Pakistan in accordance with the vision of Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, PPP founder Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and her brave daughter Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto.