The National Assembly was informed on Wednesday that the Punjab Police had recovered 68 children from illegal possession of a bogus non-government organisation (NGO), which abducted the minors for ransom. The NA was told that five FIRs had been registered after arresting 12 people involved in the crime.
In response to a calling attention notice submitted by PML-N legislators, the parliament was told that a three-member joint investigation team consisting of Lahore Chief City Police Officer, senior officers of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and Intelligence Bureau (IB) had been constituted to probe into the incident and the report would be presented in the House soon. “The children have been handed over to the Child Protection Bureau and are being reunited with their families. Such kind of incident has surfaced for the first time in history of the country in which children have been abducted by an NGO for ransom,” the reply said.
The Interior Ministry would now monitor activities of NGOs across the country following the incident, the reply added. Replying to another calling attention notice, Parliamentary Secretary for Petroleum and Natural Resources Tariq Khattak told the House that Sindh produced 70 percent of natural gas, of which 40 percent was produced from 43 wells of Qadir Pur gas fields. He said gas to 11 villages was being provided from the Mari Gas fields and survey for another 91 villages had been completed.
He said a hefty amount was being spent on the development of Ghotki district and around 120,000 people had benefited from it so far. He said a dozen field and mobile dispensaries had been set up from the amount provided by Mari Gas. Meanwhile, the National Assembly unanimously passed The Carriage by Air bill 2010 aimed at giving effect in Pakistan to the convention for the Unification of Certain Rules for International Carriage by Air, 1999, and to consolidate the laws and applicable conventions in relation to international carriage by air, as well as the law applicable to domestic carriage by air.
