Treasury benches in the Punjab Assembly (PA), instead of achieving the target of passing eight bills from the House, forced the chair to adjourn the session until today (Tuesday) and also asked it extend the session until January 9 instead of today (Tuesday). The session started an hour late at 3pm with PA Speaker Rana Iqbal in the chair. The Punjab zakat and ushr minister answered questions in the question hour. During call attention notices, Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) MPA Khadija Umer pointed out the quorum but treasury benches succeeded in showing their required strength. After call attention notices and privilege motions, the government wanted the opposition to point out the quorum but the opposition tried to counter government bills by debate and discussion.
Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) MPA Major (r) Abdul Rehman criticised PML-Q MPAs for pointing out the quorum on which Samina Khawar Hayat, Seemal Kamran and Majida Zaidi protested but Rehman continued to criticised their non-serious behaviour. Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah said that it was the House’s tradition that the opposition did not point out the quorum during call attention notices and privilege motions. He said that MPAs were sitting in a “glass house” where the press gallery conveyed all activities to 90 million people of the province.
