LAHORE  -  The Opposition in the Punjab Assembly Wednesday lodged a protest both inside and outside the Assembly against the arrest of Opposition leader Ahmad Khan Bhachar outside the Adiala jail the other day.

The Opposition staged a token boycott of the Assembly proceedings to register its protest over the arrest of its leader. Speaking on a point of order, opposition member Rana Sahbaz alleged that Ahmed Khan Bhachar was tortured and locked in a police station. He told the chair that all opposition members were staging a token walkout to protest against the opposition leader’s arrest.

The opposition members also protested  against the proposed legislation on agriculture  income tax both inside and outside the Assembly. The Chairman of the Standing Committee, Noor Alam Anwar Watoo presented the committee’s report regarding the agriculture tax in the House. Opposition’s Rana Aftab termed the bill anti-farmers citing high cost of agriculture inputs. Speaker Malik Mohammad Ahmad Khan deferred passage of the bill till Thursday (Today) saying that if the opposition has any amendments to the bill, they should present them in the House during tomorrow’s voting.  Also, the Punjab Assembly adopted a resolution against the attack on Justice Qazi Faez Isa’s car in London with a majority vote. Treasury member Ahsan Raza moved the resolution condemning the attack terming it an attack on the entire Pakistani nation. The resolution stated that a political party planned the attack on Qazi Faez Isa and incited chaos as a call for an attack on Qazi Faez Isa had been circulating on social media platforms for a week.

The resolution demanded strict legal action against those involved in this incident. “The government of the United Kingdom should be approached to register a case against the responsible parties”, the resolution further stated.  

The speaker ruled that a copy of this resolution should be sent to the federal government which should also send  a copy of this resolution to the UK’s diplomatic police.  

A member of Sunni Ittehad Council Ejaz Shafi raised the issue of smog on the Assembly floor and demanded that Senior Punjab Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb should come to the House and deliver a winding-up speech on the issue. He also demanded that the House should suspend proceedings and declare a smog emergency in the province today.  Responding to Ejaz Shafi’s concerns, Speaker Malik Mohammad Ahmad Khan said that the issue of smog will not be resolved in a day and even in  one or five years.

He said Beijing controlled smog in 10 years by shutting down factories in the cities. “How will we solve the problem…will we adopt the Beijing model by upgrading fuel from Euro 2 to Euro 6”, asked the speaker.

Speaker argued that long-term planning was needed and new cities would have to be built because existing cities were constructed without urban planning. “If the private sector builds new cities, government agencies undermine them”,said the speaker. Punjab Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman said that the opposition was politicizing the issue of smog. He also listed the measures the previous PML-N governments have been taking to overcome this issue.