PESHAWAR, June 13: The NWFP government on Friday agreed to withdraw a bill introduced on June 10 for the remission of stamp and registration duties on two welfare projects in Haripur and Kohat.

Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affairs Malik Zafar Azam, who wanted to introduce amendments to section 9 of the Stamp Act, 1899, and section 78 of the Registration Act, 1908, under the title of the North West Frontier Province Bill (Amendment of certain laws) (Amendment) Act, 2003, was of the view that the bill was aimed at attracting the well-off people to contribute in welfare schemes.

Speaker Bakht Khan allowed him to table the bill for its passage, but Abdul Akbar Khan of the PPP the opposed the bill and said if the government could compound the duties through an executive order on its own then why it was making changes into the act.

Speaking about the bill, Mr Khan said a resident of Haripur Raja Haq Nawaz Kiyani had donated his 54-marla house to the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital in Haripur and the NWFP government had donated 80 kanals to the Al Shifa Trust in Kohat.

He said the government desired to remit their duties for which the minister wanted to amend two separate acts under the title of the amendment act. The government could issue a notification and provide a relief to the welfare organizations, he added.

Mr Khan said the proposed amendments might complicate the matter in future and every donor would have to go for an amendment to the act. It was a very simple matter, but the government had chosen a complicated procedure for the promotion of a good thing, he added.

After the arguments made by Abdul Akbar, the speaker decided to keep the bill in pending till the next session. He advised the minister to remove complications in this regard.

The house passed the North West Frontier Province Civil Courts (Amendment) Bill, 2003, and the Code of Civil Procedure (North-West Frontier Province) (Amendment) Bill, 2003.

PPP’s Abdul Jabbar Khan pointed out that the bills had consequential faults if they were enacted. However, he supported them as relief-oriented for the general people. The district judges had been given powers to hear a suit of up to one million rupees. Earlier, the high court was supposed to hear such suits.

Earlier, during the question hour, senior minister Sirajul Haq informed the house that the government had planned to revive the public transport service. The government had contacted investors in China and Saudi Arabia to invest in the transport sector, he added.

Dr Seemin Mehmood Jan asked the government to run the service under the name of Sarhad Transport Service. She said the previous governments had wrapped up the government transport service in connivance with the private sector.

Mr Haq said in 1994 the then government provided Rs495 million to the GTS to overcome its losses, but the deficit rose to Rs600 million by the end of the year. Later, the then Sherpao government closed the service and wound up its operation, he added.

In response to a question by Dr Zakirullah Khan, the minister said the daily wage earners in the Forest Department had not yet been paid their dues amounting to Rs7,120,457.

The Forest Department engaged the daily wage earners during its plantation campaigns and for development work at its nurseries, but the department could not pay them as it faced shortage of funds, he added.

In reply to a question by Pir Mohammad Khan, the minister denied that the military had occupied the MPA hostel on Oct 12, 1999. The military had set up the National Accountability Bureau offices in the hostel, he added.

The minister said he was unaware about the amount collected by NAB from the accused. However, some of the accused had been fined by courts to the tune of Rs456 million. Some others struck deals with NAB amounting to Rs508.936 million, he added.

The minister said they had no procedure to deposit this amount in the NWFP government’s coffer, as NAB had received the amount. He denied that judges or NAB officials had any share in the fines collected from the accused.

The minister said NAB had yet not paid rent of the MPA hostel to the provincial government.

Later, the speaker adjourned the assembly to meet on Monday at 3pm.