ISLAMABAD: Amidst chaos and exchange of 'verbal skirmishes' between treasury and opposition benches, the Senate session was adjourned abruptly due to lack of quorum on Tuesday after opposition staged a walkout against the federal government's Pakistan Islands Development Authority (PIDA) Ordinance, 2020, which has not been laid in the either house of the Parliament so far.
At the Senate session presided over by Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani, Pakistan People's Party (PPP) leader and former chairman Senate Raza Rabbani, while speaking on the floor of the house, said PIDA Ordinance, 2020, was not laid in the Senate or National Assembly at a time when both houses are in session.
"This clearly shows what the intentions of federal government really are. By promulgating this ordinance, the federal government wants to rob the fishermen of coastal areas of Balochistan and Sindh of their livelihoods. The federal government wants to capture the resources of these provinces," he said adding that PIDA Ordinance is in violation of Article 172 (1) of Constitution of Pakistan which, he said grants the provinces the ownership of resources in their respective territorial jurisdictions.
Rabbani requested chairman Senate to admit a motion regarding PIDA Ordinance, 2020, and direct the government to lay ordinance in Parliament. Immediately as the Leader of the House in Senate Dr Shahzad Waseem took the floor, opposition staged a walkout in protest of PIDA Ordinance 2020.
Leader of the house in Senate said the federal government respects the autonomy of the provinces laid down in the constitution. Contradicting Rabbani's stance, Waseem said Article 172 (2) of the Constitution of Pakistan provides that all lands, minerals and other things of value within the continental shelf or underlying the ocean beyond the territorial waters of Pakistan shall vest in the federal government.
During the speech of leader of the house in Senate, the chairman Senate directed Sajjad Turi, the chief whip of the ruling party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in Senate, to bring the opposition back in the house. After the opposition senators returned to the house, they started chanting slogans against PIDA Ordinance. This did not go down well with the leader of the house in Senate. "An 11-party circus (Pakistan Democratic Movement-PDM) is in full swing and now we have a circus here in Senate too," he said.
"These opposition senators who are shouting and creating chaos here, everyone knows what they are up to. They have to send the footages of their 'performances' to their leaders to earn loyalty. All of them who are creating a scene here, we don't mind their follies. They don't matter at all."
Following exchange of heated arguments with PPP Parliamentary Leader in Senate Sherry Rehman, the leader of the house in Senate said "Don't shout. I haven't named any leader in my speech. It has become a habitual practice on your part-you create a scene at everything we say. You feel insulted by everything. This is not right."
Rehman pointed quorum, which was found to be lacking than the required number to continue the session following which the chairman Senate adjourned the session till Thursday. Earlier, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said India wanted to use Pakistanis for espionage against Pakistan.
He was responding to a Calling Attention Notice moved by Mushtaq Ahmed from Jamat-e-Islami (JI) regarding killings of 11 Pakistani Hindus in India. "Indian narrative of secular India is destroyed," he said.
Qureshi said Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi issued a note verbale to Indian authorities to know the exact number of Pakistani Hindus murdered in India and the circumstances in which they were murdered.
The Indian authorities were also asked to grant consular access to the lone survivor Pakistani Hindu and conduct post mortem of the 11 deceased in the presence of a representative of Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi, he said adding that Ministry of External Affairs of India used delaying tactics and has not offered a satisfactory response so far.
"This created anger among Hindu community in Pakistan that registered a two-day protest at Diplomatic Enclave in Islamabad last month and thousands of Hindus from across Pakistan participated in it. Once again we asked Indian High Commission to get registered an FIR (First Information Report) of the incident and provide copy to the victim but no response has been received. FIR of the incident has been registered in Pakistan," he said.
A petition is also pending in Islamabad High Court (IHC), the foreign minister said adding that Pakistan's key diplomatic missions across the world have been assigned to take up the matter with host countries. Speaking on the floor of the house, Leader of the Opposition in Senate Raja Zafar-ul-Haq said the federal government's response to the killings of 11 Pakistani Hindus is not enough.
"International human rights organisations should have been approached earlier as so much time has passed. Had such kind of incident taken place in Pakistan, India would have left no stone unturned to create trouble for Pakistan," he said.
Foreign minister responded that Pakistan recently got elected at United Nations Human Rights Council and matter could be highlighted there. "A step by step approach is followed to highlight matters at international levels. First, we are taking up this issue with India bilaterally and if this does not work then we would highlight the issue internationally," he said. Meanwhile, the house passed a unanimous condolence resolution on the demise of former lawmaker Rashid Rabbani from PPP.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2020